Asian tourism shows resilience after tsunami

Asian tourism shows resilience after tsunami

Agence France-Presse, Singapore

Travel bookings to Thailand and Sri Lanka, two of the hardest hit countries in the tsunami disaster, have shown a strong rebound two weeks after the devastation, a major booking agency said Tuesday.

Abacus International, Asia's largest air ticketing and reservations company, said in a statement net bookings in the week ended Jan. 9 soared 136 percent for Thailand compared with the previous week, and was up 176 percent for Sri Lanka.

In the week immediately after the Dec. 26 tsunami devastation across Asia, net bookings fell 57.9 percent for Thailand and 73.9 percent for Sri Lanka.

The number of cancellations to affected resort destinations in Phuket and Krabi in Thailand and Penang and Langkawi in Malaysia have generally declined, with net bookings -- bookings minus cancellations -- improving in the week from Jan. 3 to Jan. 9 over the previous week.

Abacus also noted bookings and net arrivals into China, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Singapore, Pakistan, Australia, New Zealand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia increased in the past two weeks.

The latest data suggested leisure travellers were "choosing to travel to other destinations in the region while reconstruction work in affected destinations is underway," Abacus president and chief executive Don Birch said.

Bookings to Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, Jakarta and Mumbai -- which escaped the giant waves triggered by a massive Indian Ocean earthquake of the Indonesian island of Sumatra -- also rose in the week ended Jan. 9, Abacus said.

"Already we are starting to see a recovery in affected markets," Birch said.

"Travel is incredibly resilient and we know from experience that recovery time is surprisingly short following a crisis. I am confident that travel to the worst affected destinations will be close to its previous levels within six months," he said.

Birch said the impact of the disaster was unlikely to affect the region's economic growth, echoing similar projections by other economists.

"Travel to resorts represents only a small percentage of the 120 million international journeys forecast for next year in Asia-Pacific," Birch said.

The death toll from the disaster topped 157,000, most of them from Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Millions more have been rendered homeless.