26 Mar, 2022
The Ministry of Sports and Tourism has announced a plan to suspend the Thailand Pass registration and Test and Go program if the number of Covid-19 infections and fatalities does not rise during and after the Songkran holidays in April.
Tourism and Sports Minister Phiphat Ratchakitprakarn stated that the upcoming Thai New Year holidays will determine whether the government can ease travel rules in the upcoming months. The ministry will submit additional proposals to the Center for Covid-19 Situation Administration (CCSA) after accessing the situation in April, which could lead to the cancellation of the Test and Go scheme and Thailand Pass on July 1st, 2022.
The CCSA, starting April 1st, is set to suspend the pre-travel RT-PCR test for international arrivals. It will, on May 1st, begin conducting its on-arrival test using an antigen test kit (ATK).
The Ministry has set a target of 7 million arrivals for 2022 after revising its previous forecast of 10 million due to the spread of the Omicron variant and the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The ministry hopes that this year’s tourism revenue will reach 30% of what it was in 2019, before increasing to 50% the following year and fully recovering by 2024. (NNT)
