Sukhothai is planing 10 days of festivities for tourists and locals to experience the beauty of Loy Krathong festival.
The event takes place from October 23 to November 1 at Sukhothai Historical Park, the Unesco World Cultural Heritage Site.
The festival will be held among the 700-year-old ruins of the city’s cultural heritage in keeping with a long-standing tradition, and the stunning setting helps reflect the delights of Thai history, tradition, and cultural values.
Sukhothai is the birthplace of the Loy Krathong festival.
Sukhothai province, in cooperation with The Tourism Authority of Thailand, Sports Authority of Thailand, and the Sukhothai Provincial Administrative Organisation, aims to ensure that the value of arts and culture of the Sukhothai people is understood across the world while helping to stimulate the economy, supplement the income of local communities, and drive recovery of the domestic tourism industry in Thailand, the organisers said.
The highlighted activities would include Ancient Sukhothai Period market to take people back to old times with local products and a variety of food, “The history of Sukhothai” light and sound show, contemporary performances on stage, Nang Nopphamat beauty contests, Phlu, Talai, Fai Phaniang pyrotechnics (fireworks display), at the Wat Sa Si temple (Traphang Trakuan), one of the world’s most visited tourist attractions, and many more activities.
By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · No Author · BUSINESS, US-GLOBAL-MARKETS
Travel in China rebounded over the eight-day holiday period this month as the nation displayed further evidence that it is overcoming the coronavirus pandemic, with about 637 million trips made, government data show.
While that was down from the 782 million trips made during the same period in 2019, it is much better than during the 5-day holiday period in May, according to Macquarie Group economists. The full total for the Autumn Festival period was 81% of 2019’s level, data from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism released late Thursday show.
The containment of the virus provided the basic public health conditions for holiday activities, which showed an “obvious revival,” according to a report from Citigroup. “Household purchasing power recovered steadily, and consumer confidence also came back on overall economic recovery,” they wrote.
The number of trips doesn’t indicate the number of people who travel, according to the China Tourism Academy. A single person could make multiple trips during the same holiday.
Domestic tourism income during the holiday was about 467 billion yuan ($70 billion), according to the ministry. That is down 28% from the seven-day holiday a year earlier, according to Bloomberg calculations, when income was 650 billion yuan.
There was a strong recovery in consumer spending during the holiday period, according to economists at Macquarie led by Chief China Economist Larry Hu. This suggests that “service consumption, largely driven by the pent-up demand, could rebound quickly once things are returning to normal.”
One factor boosting domestic tourism is the effective collapse of international movement due to travel bans and stringent quarantine requirements on returning to China. Mainland visitors to Hong Kong were down 99%, and dropped 85% to Macau during the holiday period, Macquarie said.
“Many brands in the luxury hospitality sector are back to pre-Covid levels of occupancy,” said Chloé Reuter, founding partner Gusto Luxe & Gusto Collective. “Sanya in Hainan is a key destination for domestic travelers and for shoppers at the largest duty free mall in the world,” but more experiential and back-to-nature destinations like Yunnan are also seeing high numbers of travelers, she said.
There was an 149% increase in duty-free shopping in Hainan Island in southern China over the holiday, Chinese customs said, according to a state TV report Friday.
However, schools in Beijing and other places were discouraging their students from traveling during the period, which may have undercut demand.
“Travel to the western regions indicated that consumers are releasing pent-up demand due to lockdown during Chinese New Year and shift from international tourism to domestic,” according to Jason Yu, managing director at Kantar Worldpanel Greater China.
By Syndication Washington Post, The Japan News-Yomiuri · No Author · WORLD, ASIA-PACIFIC The government plans to promote teleworking on remote islands close to its borders by supporting travel there, as it aims to preserve the nation’s territory in addition to assisting local tourism.
The Cabinet Office will focus on promoting “workations” – a new lifestyle concept that combines work with vacation – on its remote inhabited islands by discounting travel costs and supporting the renovation of accommodation facilities.
Government support will partly cover the costs incurred by hotels and inns to create new work spaces for guests and set up satellite offices for companies. In order to make the facilities more convenient as workplaces, the government will also support the development of Wi-Fi and the operation of charter flights.
The Cabinet Office has earmarked 6.2 billion yenin its budget request for fiscal 2021.
Of the 148 inhabited remote islands, the government will support 71 across eight prefectures including Okushiri Island in Hokkaido, Miyakejima island in Tokyo and the Goto Islands in Nagasaki Prefecture.
The government has designated the 71 islands as Specific Inhabited Remote National Border Islands from the perspective of territorial integrity, because the islands could become uninhabited without proper maintenance.
This support is also meant to leverage local tourism, the main industry on these islands, which has been hit by the spread of the novel coronavirus.
The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) is planning to “relaunch” Khao San Road on October 30 in an effort to stimulate the economy.
Sakoltee Phattiyakul, deputy Bangkok governor, said the street in the capital’s Bang Lamphu area was once a backpackers’ heaven, but has come to a standstill after the country shut its doors due to Covid-19.
Hence, he said, BMA needs to find a way to have the area buzzing again.
He said the relaunching ceremony will be family friendly and include art exhibitions, mini concerts, stalls and restaurants.
The event, which will kick off under the auspices of Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, will run from 9am to midnight. The following day, the street will be transformed for Halloween.
“We are taking measures to curb the transmission of Covid-19 and will screen all visitors for fever and weapons. The traffic will also be well managed,” he said.
By The Washington Post · Lori Aratani, Michael Laris · NATIONAL, WORLD, POLITICS, TRANSPORTATION, TRAVEL WASHINGTON – Advocates of federal aid to keep 33,000 airline employees on the job lobbied for months, sending thousands of letters and donning protective masks to walk the halls of Congress. And it appeared to be working, garnering bipartisan backing and support from President Donald Trump, who just last month said: “We’ll be helping the airlines.”
It all unraveled Tuesday with a series of tweets.
“I have instructed my representatives to stop negotiating until after the election when, immediately after I win, we will pass a major Stimulus Bill that focuses on hard-working Americans and Small Business,” Trump tweeted.
And it’s not just airline workers who will feel the impact.
From Amtrak workers to bus drivers, employees keeping U.S. transportation systems running are now facing months – perhaps years – of economic pain in an environment where millions are already out of work.
“This is a huge disappointment for people who are really hurting,” said Ray LaHood, a former Republican congressman who served as transportation secretary under President Obama, citing “devastating” impacts on aviation and transit systems nationwide.
“This is not the right time to be pulling the plug on negotiations . . . Some of these industries will take years to come back to where they were,” he said.
LaHood said talks between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin seemed within reach of the kind of success the two had earlier this year on a series of aid bills. But LaHood said it seems Trump’s chief of staff prevailed on the president to take a harder line this time.
“Mark Meadows has kind of carried the tea party agenda for not being willing to spend the kind of money it’s going to take to get our economy moving again,” LaHood said. “That’s where the stalemate has really happened . . . Apparently, he got to the president on this one.”
A senior Trump administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, called that characterization “laughably out of touch,” adding that Meadows has not been involved in the talks in the past two or three weeks. “Democrats are dug in here regardless of who’s negotiating. This is all about politics for them,” the official said.
Beyond the Beltway, local officials girded for severe challenges. “Transportation powers America, and the declines in ridership and air travel we’ve seen profoundly undermine our recovery,” said Phoenix Mayor Kate Gallego, a Democrat. “I’m deeply disappointed to see the President abandon the relief effort when there is truly no time to waste.”
Even after Congress failed to meet a Sept. 30 deadline for extending support for airlines, backers remained optimistic something would come together. Pelosi urged airlines to delay furloughs. Executives at American Airlines and United Airlines said they would be willing to reverse the furloughs, provided a deal came together quickly.
Democrats had included support for airlines in the $2.2 trillion package they were seeking, while the White House’s most recent offer was closer to $1.6 trillion. For airlines there appeared to be two possible paths forward: either as part of the larger relief package or as a stand-alone bill. At one point, Trump had even suggested he’d take executive action to prevent airline layoffs.
The airline industry has been devastated by the pandemic, losing billions in revenue as passenger traffic, particularly the more lucrative international routes, has plunged to new lows. About one-third of aircraft remain parked and executives expect it will take years for the industry to recover.
The $25 billion in grant money provided through the coronavirus relief package known as the Cares Act was designed keep workers on the job as airlines navigated through the crisis. Among the conditions for receiving the money, carriers had to agree not to furlough workers or cut their pay before Oct. 1.
Airlines say furloughs will begin Thursday after hope for a deal to extend the Cares Act fades
Despite Trump’s tweet, Nicholas E. Calio, chief executive of Airlines for America, which represents some of the largest U.S. carriers, said he remained hopeful that an agreement could be reached.
“Time already ran out for U.S. airlines and many of our employees, yet there is a glimmer of hope that our leaders in Washington will act and save these jobs before it’s too late to turn back the clock,” Calio said in a statement. “Some U.S. airlines may be able to reinstate employees if they receive direct payroll assistance from the federal government soon, but that becomes increasingly challenging with each passing day.”
United and American Airlines began furloughing workers last week after the Sept. 30 deadline passed without a deal.
In an interview last month, American Airlines chief executive Doug Parker said if workers were furloughed, the airline wouldn’t be able to quickly rehire enough people to match demand as it picks up because they will require months of retraining, something he said could hamper a broader economic recovery.
“We’re disheartened to hear that negotiations over a COVID-19 relief package are not progressing,” Parker said in a statement Tuesday.
“The past week has dealt a crushing blow to the American Airlines team and the aviation industry, and we were hopeful that overwhelming bipartisan support for the Payroll Support Program would result in immediate action to protect jobs and service to communities across the country,” American said in a statement. “We will continue to make the case in Washington that action is needed to help workers across the country and lead America to the other side of this pandemic.”
United Airlines said it would do everything it could to urge leaders to reach a deal.
“As we have made clear, we are eager to reverse the furlough process should Congress pass legislation to extend the CARES Act Payroll Support Program, and we will continue to update our employees on the latest as this unfolds,” the airline said in a statement.
Meanwhile, union officials reacted with anger to Trump’s tweet.
“As Secretary Mnuchin and Speaker Pelosi moved close to a deal that would provide relief to working people across the country, President Trump issued one tweet to blow up the deal and leave millions of essential workers in free-fall,” Sara Nelson, president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which represents 50,000 flight attendants at 20 airlines, said in a statement. “Senate Republicans will own this cruel maneuver that puts our economy in a tailspin unless they demand COVID relief now.”
Other transportation modes also are making cuts.
Amtrak this month slashed operations and its workforce, furloughing 2,050 workers. The railroad said last month it needs $4.9 billion in federal assistance – including $2.8 billion in supplemental funding – to help make up for pandemic-related losses.
Amtrak’s ridership plummeted 97 percent in the weeks after the coronavirus hit the nation. Six months into the crisis, ridership and revenue are still down 80 percent compared to a year ago, according to the company.
Amtrak chief executive William Flynn told lawmakers last month that if Congress does not provide the supplemental funding, even more dramatic reductions across the company would be necessary to “stave off bankruptcy.”
The Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority also could be forced to make steep cuts.
“With 1,700 jobs on the line, we are devastated to learn that negotiations to continue Covid Relief Funding have been abruptly cut off, likely for weeks,” Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said. “Let’s be clear: Metro is out of time. This will impact riders and hurt transit employees – the same heroes who were on the front-lines transporting nurses, first responders, federal employees, and small business owners every day of this pandemic – who now face the imminent threat of layoffs as service cuts go into effect.”
The potential cuts would affect not only Metro, but transit agencies across the United States and will be tough on workers and riders, advocates said. Union leaders said job losses and onboard safety are both at stake.
Fewer buses will lead to “overcrowding, which is going to create more of an issue with the spread of the coronavirus. I’ve lost 89 members already, and this is going to do more,” said John Costa, international president of the Amalgamated Transit Union.
Costa said the billions in additional aid for transit would, in addition to staving off layoffs, have gone toward needed personal protective gear for drivers and other workers, and for equipment to make vehicles safer.
The American Public Transportation Association said a recent survey of its members showed “that 6 in 10 public transit systems will need to reduce service and furlough employees in the coming months without emergency federal funding from Congress.” It said nearly half of businesses in the public transit industry expect layoffs, and a nearly third “are concerned that they may go out of business” without additional aid.
“There are millions of workers in American cities who will be stranded if transit agencies don’t get relief, and this decision today is going to be devastating for agency budgets,” said Ben Fried, a spokesman for the research and advocacy organization TransitCenter.
“The front line transportation workers who have been at the center of COVID-19 relief efforts have real financial and health and safety needs that deserve immediate congressional action,” said Larry Willis, president of the Transportation Trades Department, AFL-CIO, a coalition of 33 unions. “The game President Trump is playing will have severe immediate and long-term consequences that will disproportionately impact those who have been seeing us through this crisis.”
Scores of tourism operators at Bang Saen beach, one of the most popular tourist attractions in Chonburi province, were left high and dry after a storm hit the province.
The beach wore a deserted look on Saturday despite the weekend holidays. Local tourism is struggling to return to normal since the months-long lockdown after the Covid-19 outbreak.
Local vendors were already handicapped by the social distancing measure, which restricted the beach chairs that could be rented to visitors.
The higher price of the beach chairs, at Bt30 to Bt59, is also making Bang Sean beach less appealing to tourists, according to some observers.
Masseurs who work nearby said that this year has seen the lowest number of visitors in 15 years due to the pandemic situation and the weather.
Samut Prakan residents went ahead with the lotus-throwing festival held yearly to mark the end of Buddhist Lent despite restrictions put in place to curb the spread of Covid-19.
People crowded both sides of the Bang Phli canal every day from Monday to Thursday this week to pay respect to the image of Luang Pho To paraded up and down the waterway.
This ancient festival starts on the 14th day of each year’s 11th waxing moon, which usually falls in September or October.
The Luang Phor To Buddha statue is picked up from Bang Phli Yai temple and reinstated in a boat decorated with flowers. The boat then cruises up and down the canal to allow worshippers to shower it with lotus flowers. Belief has it that if a flower thrown at the boat lands near the Buddha image, the worshipper’s wish will be granted.
This year’s event went well, with crowds gathered at both sides of the canal, though not everybody was wearing a mask to protect themselves.
Phuket needs to rebrand its “expensive” image to stimulate tourism, as its natural environs have been rehabilitated during the lockdown, Pikun Srimahunt, chief SME Banking Officer at Siam Commercial Bank (SCB), said.
The price of accommodation and restaurants in Phuket now has become more affordable than before, but it is not well publicised as a result Thai people were missing an opportunity, she said.
SCB has launched “SCB IEP Bootcamp: The Hospitality Survival” project, which is a collaboration with the Tourism Authority of Thailand to train local entrepreneurs for three days to help them rebrand Phuket’s tourism business.
“Thai people believe Phuket is expensive. We have to communicate that it is no longer true since you can book three days in a Phuket hotel for around Bt4,000,” she said, adding that some places had dropped their price from Bt2,000 to Bt750.
The training will guide entrepreneurs to reduce 35-40 per cent of the cost and expand the market by targeting digital platforms, while SCB will help sustain the business until international tourists return.
Phuket normally depends on international tourists, and 10 million out of 14 million are foreigners, annually generating Bt470 billion.
By The Washington Post · Steven Zeitchik · BUSINESS, FEATURES, US-GLOBAL-MARKETS, TRAVEL Disney announced Tuesday that it would lay off 28,000 people across its theme-park division in the United States, demonstrating the devastating toll covid-19 has taken on its core business.
About two-thirds of those losing their jobs are part-time employees, the company said.
“As heartbreaking as it is to take this action, this is the only feasible option we have in light of the prolonged impact of COVID-19 on our business, including limited capacity due to physical distancing requirements and the continued uncertainty regarding the duration of the pandemic,” Josh D’Amaro, chairman of Disney’s theme park unit, said in a letter to employees.
The company did not reveal what percentage of its workforce that entailed, but it’s believed the U.S. theme parks employ about 200,000 people, which would make the layoffs a workforce reduction of 14%.
Disney parks in California remain closed while Florida parks, which reopened in July, have been underperforming.
The company had furloughed 100,000 employees worldwide at the height of the lockdowns in the spring. Many were brought back when Walt Disney World reopened this summer.
Theme parks have taken the brunt of the toll as the virus has limited or scuttled public gatherings. In the most recent April-June quarter, Disney’s theme-park division reported less than a billion dollars in revenue, after taking in nearly $7 billion in the same period in 2019. The division posted a loss of $2 billion over the period.
Business has not significantly picked up since. On an earnings call in August, Bob Chapek, the Disney chief executive who previously ran the theme-park division, acknowledged that its Walt Disney World locations in Central Florida have not seen the traffic executives had hoped for when they reopened in July. The parks, he said, had undergone a “higher-than-expected level of cancellations.”
In response the company cut back the parks’ hours. Walt Disney World in particular relies on travel from other states. Airlines are preparing to cut 35,000 jobs this week as people ground their travel plans.
The layoffs came as the company prepared to end its fiscal 2020 on Wednesday; the timing, some Wall Street analyst believe, is not coincidental as Disney seeks to shore up its expenses heading into a new period.
In a statement Tuesday, the company partly pointed the finger at California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, who has kept bans on large public gatherings in place in his state. The situation, it said, was “exacerbated in California by the State’s unwillingness to lift restrictions that would allow Disneyland to reopen.”
The comment is an about-face from a perceived coziness between Newsom and the company’s leaders, including executive chair Bob Iger, at the start of the pandemic. Newsom for a short time exempted Disneyland from the restrictions and called the parks a “nation-state” in explaining the leniency.
Disney is eager for a California reopening because the parks there do not rely on outside travel nearly as much as its Florida business.
Newsom, though, warned several days ago of another infection surge and said a further lockdown of businesses could be coming if matters do not improve; he also said school reopenings could be affected.
At least one expert believes that Disney’s announcement Tuesday was as much a leverage-seeking move aimed at Newsom as it was a substantive reduction.
“Everything Disney does is for a strategic reason,” said Scott Smith, a professor at the University of South Carolina’s College of Hospitality, Retail and Sport Management who closely follows the theme-park industry.
“If a lot of these are people part timers who are very seasonal and they’re just not having their hours picked up, it may not be as drastic as it sounds. But it grabs headlines, and that’s useful to Disney,” he said. “Because they want a plan from the governor of California so they can at least get started with reopening. It puts some subtle pressure – or not-so-subtle pressure – on him to do something.”
The layoffs arrive as Disney faces challenges on other fronts.
The company last week moved all major films out of the 2020 calendar, with the earliest rescheduled for May. The film studio has not seen major layoffs yet.
In the meantime, the company has been feverishly trying to stir up revenue elsewhere. On Tuesday and Wednesday, it was scheduling press calls to promote its new season of shows on ABC, which begin airing next month. Among the first networks to jump back into production after a coronavirus hiatus that stretched from the spring into the summer, ABC”s new programming, the company hopes, will draw much-needed advertising dollars.
Meanwhile, Disney’s parks in other countries, including France and China, remain open, with the latter experiencing an increase in capacity in recent weeks.
The news also comes at a tense moment for the U.S. economy.
The jobs market has been rebounding since its nadir in the spring, but concerns continue to grow about the potential for a second contraction. Economists have been warning for months about the damage yet to come from both the continuing march of the virus and the expiration of the generous government benefits that helped support families and companies earlier in the pandemic.
The September unemployment rate, 8.4% in August, will be released on Friday. The leisure and hospitality sector has been one of the most hard hit during the pandemic, with employment down more than 20% in August compared with the same month in 2019.
More than 4,000 tourists visited Yala province’s iconic Ai Yerweng skywalk to enjoy a view of the sea of mist from an altitude of over 600 metres, Anan Boonsamran, chief of Betong district, said on Sunday.
“The province has opened the skywalk free of charge since September 24 to boost domestic tourism,” he said. “Tourists are flocking here early in the morning at 5.30 to 7am to witness the sea of mist. During the weekend, when there are more visitors than the skywalk’s capacity, we have to limit the time for each round, and tourists may still have to queue up for hours to get their turn,” he said.
The 61-metre skywalk is believed to be the longest in the Asean region and includes the Ai Yerweng Tower from where tourists can enjoy a panoramic view of Betong at sunrise and sunset.
“The province is also looking into the parking space problem, as most tourists get here in their own cars, causing traffic congestion and inadequate parking space especially during weekends,” added Anan. “We are looking into the possibility of providing public transport to reduce the need of private vehicles.”
The district chief also added that the free admission period would continue until further announcement from the Royal Forest Department.
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