Opportunity and Competitiveness in the Tourism Business in Thailand

Abstract

The study aimed to know the circumstances and competitiveness in the tourism business in Thailand. The study derived information from secondary data and primary data received from in-depth interviews and focus groups of stakeholders in the Thailand tourism business. The analysis based on the Diamond Model found that the tourism business was one of the industrial supply chains that acquires 60,000 million baht of total market value in the tourism industry that was worth more than 1 trillion baht each year. The number oftourism businesses enrolled in the Department of Business Development increased by
8,068 from 2012 to 2013, or 4.55%. Most of these businesses were SMEs that had only 3-5 permanent employees and 10-15 freelance guides. The study of competitiveness found that the Thailand tourism business had grown continuously in line with the increased number of tourists. The investment capital for doing businesses is was not high. The employees and tourist guides provided a high quality of services as well as being strongly service minded, but usually lacked tourist guides during high seasons. The government continuously supported the tourism business because they recovered quickly when Thailand faced severe problems. However, Thailand tourism businesses still face several problems, such as access to sources of investment funds, lack of law enforcement of tourism businesses, which affect Thailand’s tourism image, and the lack of guides who speak other languages besides English. Therefore, if both the government and private sectors cooperate with each other to solve the problem of access to sources of investment funds, enforcing the aw, and cooperating with educational institutions on training and increasing the number of tour leaders who are proficient, not only in English but also other languages, they will develop Thailand’s tourism business into a sustainable industry.