Korea sees Thai tourist numbers drop for 7 months
Korea has seen a dramatic decline in the number of Thai tourists over the past seven months, amid ongoing complaints and anti-Korean sentiment related to Korea’s electronic visa-waiver system, which frequently denies entry to travelers from Thailand.
The number of Thai nationals who visited Korea last month dropped by 19.5 percent from a year ago to 20,150, according to the Korea Tourism Organization, Tuesday.
The decline has persisted for seven consecutive months.
This shift has moved Thailand, which once topped Korea’s list of countries from Southeast Asia in terms of visitor numbers, to third place in April and fifth place since May.
The cumulative number of visitors from Thailand in the first half of this year declined 19.1 percent from a year ago to 168,328.
The decrease contrasts with the overall 커뮤니티 recovery of inbound tourists to Korea after the COVID-19 pandemic. In June, over 1.41 million foreign travelers visited Korea, a 47.5 percent jump from the same period last year.
Before the pandemic, Thailand sent the most visitors to Korea among Southeast Asian nations, with 572,000 visitors in 2019, driven by the explosive popularity of K-pop, K-dramas and other Korean cultural content.
However, the decline came amid the issue of the electronic travel permit system last year.
Introduced in September 2021, Korea Electronic Travel Authorization (K-ETA) allows travelers from 112 countries to register their information online and grants them permission to enter Korea.
However, numerous refusals for Thai nationals entering the country were reported among Thai travelers, fueling anti-Korean sentiment in Thailand.