Thailand’s B2B travel trade show, Thailand Travel Mart Plus Amazing Gateway to the Greater Mekong Subregion (TTM+) 2019 will take place in Pattaya from June 5-7, 2019. Under the theme of “New Shades of Emerging Destinations”, the TTM+ 2019 has attracted 351 buyers, 371 sellers, and around 130 international and domestic media. For the second consecutive year, the event will be held at the Ocean Marina Yacht Club, the biggest marina in Southeast Asia.
TAT says that the overall focus of the show will be Thailand’s emerging destinations, 55 provinces with spectacular beauty, heritage, cultural and culinary attractions.
Yuthasak Supasorn, Governor, TAT said, “This year’s theme reflects a strong continuation of our long-standing strategy to promote our emerging destinations with the aim of creating jobs and distributing revenue nationwide, from major cities to local communities, while creating sustainability by balancing the number of visitors to the destinations. Both international and domestic buyers will find these 55 emerging destinations perfectly suited to the needs of their clients, especially those who seek off-the-beaten-path holidays and repeaters looking for new products. In fact, we are already beginning to see results. In 2018, we recorded six million (6,223,183) trips by foreign tourists to these cities, a growth of +4.95 per cent over 2017.”
As of May 14, 2019, the TTM+ 2019 had registered 351 buyers from 51 countries. Of these 185 are repeaters and 166 are first-time buyers. By country, the largest number is from China (65) followed by the United Kingdom (29), India (23), Australia (18), Italy (15), USA (15), Russia (14), and Brazil (13). By region, buyers from the EU, Africa and Middle East comprise the largest contingent (136) followed by ASEAN, South Asia and the South Pacific (95), East Asia (79) and the Americas (41).
Of the 371 registered sellers, 278 are hotels and resorts followed by travel agents and tour operators (23), emerging destinations (20), entertainment (12), the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) (10), NTOs (10) associations (9), and others (9). Of these, 40.89 per cent are from the South, Central Region (30.47 per cent), the East (12.76 per cent), North (5.47 per cent), Northeast (6.77 per cent), GMS (2.6 per cent), and NTOs (1.04 per cent).
