Source: Bangkok Post

This site has been quiet over the past month or so as tens of thousands of demonstrators set up camp in Bangkok demanding fresh elections. Yesterday talks between both sides went ahead but Prime Minister Abhisit ended them when pressed about a timeframe for parliamentary dissolution. He left the country today for a short visit to Brunei, but was scheduled to return to resume the talks. The outcome is not likely to be settled for years and, outside the political arena, not much has changed in Thailand. [ ED KCI]

The government and the red shirt leaders’ decision to sit down for talks to settle the continuing political conflict is most welcome.

Although the positions of the two parties remained far apart at the end of their three-hour meeting yesterday, it began a long-overdue process to resolve the differences between the groups.

Needless to say, the two-week stand-off between the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) and the government has caused much anxiety for all Thais. The massive street gatherings and the deployment of security forces in the capital have disrupted the lives of Bangkokians. They have also caused immeasurable damage to the economy.

A series of dramatic stunts staged by the red shirts in which protesters were sent to military barracks and other public and private places have increased the danger of violence. A series of bomb attacks on government buildings, state-run TV stations and commercial banks are strong indicators that the “peaceful” protest might not remain that way for long. Those behind these subversive plots – regardless of their motivations – must be condemned. With or without the red shirts’ knowledge, these senseless and barbaric acts must stop if all stakeholders in the present dispute are sincere in wanting to lead the country out of its sorry state.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva should be commended for being open-minded in embracing the peace talks with the UDD leaders. His decision to welcome them at the negotiating table has helped significantly ease the political tensions that have gripped Bangkok for the past fortnight.

With the prime minister and the red shirt leaders agreeing to resume talks later today, it is hoped both sides will come up with more accommodating propositions to make the peace talks fruitful.

The red shirt leaders in particular must demonstrate more sincerity and flexibility. Their offer to give the government two more weeks to dissolve the lower house is still far from acceptable as it fails to explain how this will lead to reconciliation.

Mr Abhisit has already made clear that he does not object to a snap election but prefers to see some fundamental rules in place to ensure a lasting reconciliation in the country. These may involve constitutional amendments and guarantees that all parties will accept election results. He suggested at the talks that concerned parties work out a clear road map to provide a basis for a new election before the lower house is dissolved. This proposal is reasonable and should be supported by the red shirts if they are sincere about their calls for true democracy in Thailand.

Three days to wait now for the Thai Supreme Court’s decision on former prime minister’s Bt76 billion asset seizure case. The government has beefed up security around the capital, while the “red-shirt” protesters, who support Mr Thaksin, have threatened to stage rallies if the Supreme Court’s ruling should go against him.

Meanwhile, fugitive Thaksin Shinawatra recent claim that he is “not concerned” about having his 76 billion baht seized by the government sounds all too hollow. If so, why all the fuss, one could ask?

Anyway, yesterday there a seminar on Thailand’s future where Thaksin participated via a video conference call, in which he claimed that Thailand has been without justice for the past five years. Definitions of “justice” sometimes run counter to perceptions here but he said that he had received complaints from foreign investors about “the dubious business practices in Thailand”. Now, that is rich.

He went on to warn that foreign investments could easily evaporate should Thailand’s political situation remain unstable. The former prime minister was in no mood for conciliation and blamed all of the problems of Thailand on “the person with influence” who initiated the coup, reiterating that there was no “wrongdoing”, saying the money had been earned prior to him entering politics. Not quite.

According to The Nation newspaper, the final quarter of 2009 saw the Thai economy “rebound from a year-long recession”, with growth in the fourth quarter surging 5.8 per cent from a year earlier. JP Morgan suggested Thailand will “see a 6.5 per cent growth rate” this year, with a rebound in exports and government spending helped the economic turnaround. That is, if Mr Thaksin really does shrug his shoulders if the sequestration order proceeds against him.

Surprisingly, tourist revenues in December “jumped sharply to help turn the Thai economy around”. But this upturn now heavily depends on the fallout as from Friday, as domestic political uncertainty is back in the frame. And although the Supreme Court, which is due to rule on Friday on the Bt76 billion asset seizure case, with the government having beefed up security around the capital, there are still fears that the red-shirt protesters, who support Thaksin, have threatened to stage rallies if the Supreme Court’s ruling should go against him.

On the front page of the Bangkok Post today, the accusations got even steamier, with the New Politics Party spokeman, the former “yellow-shirts”, clamining that there were rumours that “five of the nine judges” had been offered “one billion baht each” to turn the ruling in Thaksin’s favour.

At this point, despite the welcome news of recovery, the Thai economy is still being held hostage by the political uncertainty. Less than three days to go before the court’s verdict, most Thais are holding their breath about the possible outcome. No matter what the ruling is, the political uncertainty will continue to drag on, probably until March. With this uncertainty, the business environment is likely to be subdued and the high growth rate expectations might turn out to be overly optimistic.

Amongst all this, Sports Minister Chumpol Silpa-archa said that “1.579 million visitors arrived in Thailand in January, a 24.35% increase over the same month last year.” I would ask him to take a look at the Ko Chang Island stats that suggest March is significantly down on lat year.

Travel agents and tourists have been asking the TAT how the verdict will affect the country’s stability and infrastructure, with England, France, Italy, Belgium, Germany and Australia having issued travel advisories, telling their citizens to be careful while visiting Thailand and to avoid areas with demonstrations in non-tourist areas.

Citing the world’s economy recovery, this year would be a “golden year of Thailand’s tourism sector”, if there in no unrest, because more foreign arrivals are expected. With the red-shirts seem to to running out of steam, and perhaps money, the Thai public is thoroughly fed up with their political manipulations.

It’s hard to tell the outcome of either the assets seizure case and their reaction to it, but for those who want to skip the capital and enjoy a peaceful holiday in the sun with slack regard for Thailand’s political shenanigans, Ko Chang is still the beautiful, peaceful island it always was.

Source: Bangkok Post

Asean tourism ministers have admitted failure in their efforts to promote Asean as a single destination and develop the Asean tourism brand. As a result, they have embarked on a new campaign built on the fact that “Southeast Asia” has greater recognition in international source markets than “Asean”.

The region’s tourism promoters hope that www.southeastasia.org will draw more visitors.

The campaign will target tourists in medium- and long-haul markets such as the UK, Australia, India, North America and Hong Kong. It is part of a $4-million Asean Competitiveness Enhancement (ACE) project funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) from 2008-13.

In January 2009, the ACE project consultants signed an agreement with the Asean Tourism Association (AseanTA), which groups the region’s private-sector travel industry associations, to develop a new, more effective marketing strategy that promotes Southeast Asia as a single destination.

The new campaign unveiled last week at the Asean Tourism Forum in Brunei elevates the name “Southeast Asia” to co-branded status with “Asean”.

It’s a sharp turnaround from the first Asean Tourism Agreement signed by heads of state in November 2002, which committed them to “promoting Asean as a brand in the international market”.

That agreement also committed the leaders to supporting the (now defunct) Visit Asean Campaign, with thematic tour packages and attractions to encourage visitors to focus on specific areas of interest.

The agreement was aimed at fostering co-operation among Asean national tourism organisations (NTOs) and the industry, particularly airlines, hotels and resorts, travel agencies and tour operators, in marketing and promoting transnational tour packages, including sub-regional growth areas.

However, a study of the impact of Visit Asean, done in May 2007 by Dr Noel Scott, a senior research fellow at the School of Tourism, University of Queensland, reported a “lack of progress at the outcome level”, a euphemistic way of saying it had gone nowhere.

Funded by AusAID, the Australian aid agency, the study pinpointed “a number of underlying issues” such as:

- Alack of sufficient and guaranteed funding to enable a branding campaign to take place.

- Alack of marketing strategy and plan based on consumer and trade research and endorsed by relevant government stakeholders and the industry.

The report was ignored by tourism ministers and the Asean secretariat, which subsequently called for the marketing strategy and brand campaign to be “revisited”. That led to another strategy in June 2009, this one funded by USAID, which said it was time for a change and that “Southeast Asia” would be more appropriate as a brand.

Over the last 12 months, the new approach has been debated intensively. In spite of reservations expressed by Thailand and Malaysia, the switch to the new brand image has won favour largely for purely marketing reasons.

It has also allowed the Asean tourism industry to sweep its own failures under the carpet.

In the most glaring example of this failure, the Asean Tourism Agreement had mandated the “expanding and strengthening [of] Asean co-operation in overseas markets and major international tourism and travel-trade fairs”.

The Noel Scott study noted that setting up a common Asean area in major international travel trade shows was “one of the easiest” ideas to implement.

“A common Asean area in international travel fairs is a specific location/contiguous space where all participating Asean NTOs would co-locate their destination booths. The benefits of such co-location are that it promotes the Asean member countries as a cohesive unit among the trade buyers and sellers.”

But, apart from a single Asean common area at the China International Travel Mart 2006 in Shanghai, no such collective effort was ever made.

Moreover, none of the present generation of tourism leaders has any recollection of the highly successful Visit Asean Year staged in 1992 to mark the 25th anniversary of Asean.

Several marketing gurus and online travel experts have lauded the new campaign, which they say will gather steam with the amount of money set to be thrown at developing content and marketing the new website http://www.southeastasia.org.

But for others, it has only buttressed the claim that Asean has a long way to go in putting its money where its mouth is.

“If they could commit hara-kiri with their own tourism branding, how do they expect to succeed in forging a wider Asean identity?” asked one cynic.

Source: AFP

The Asia-Pacific region has overtaken North America as the world’s largest air travel market with 647 million passengers in 2009, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said Monday.

By contrast, 638 million people flew on commercial flights in North America last year, IATA announced at an aviation business conference on the eve of the Singapore Airshow featuring the world’s leading aviation industry players.

Within Asia, China has eclipsed Japan over the past decade as the region’s largest domestic market, with 1,400 aircraft compared with Japan’s 540 and 5.7 million weekly seats against 2.6 million in Japan.

The Singapore Airshow is taking place after a harrowing year in the global aviation industry, which lost an estimated 11 billion dollars in 2009 as a result of the financial meltdown that began in the United States.

IATA director general Giovanni Bisignani told the conference that the Asia-Pacific market would continue to grow rapidly with an estimated 217 million additional air passengers a year in the region by 2013. Related article: China’s online travel market booming

“While we see dynamism and diversity within the region, the aspect of Asia-Pacific that excites me most is its potential,” said Bisignani.

“More than a quarter of the 2.2 billion people who flew last year, or 647 million people, flew within Asia-Pacific markets.

“It has eclipsed travel within North America as the traditional leader in traffic numbers.”

IATA represents some 230 carriers that account for more than 90 percent of scheduled air traffic, but does not include many of the budget airlines credited with a boom in short and medium-haul travel in recent years.

Its members in Europe, the Asia-Pacific region, and North America recorded year-on-year declines in passenger demand of 5.0 to 5.6 percent in 2009, according to an IATA report released Friday.

But Asian airlines staged a strong recovery in December, when demand grew 8.0 percent from a year ago, nearly twice the global average, the IATA report said.

Bisignani told the conference that Asian airlines were projected to narrow their losses collectively to 700 million US dollars this year from 3.4 billion dollars in 2009, about a third of the industry’s global losses last year.

“It is tough in all regions but Asia-Pacific’s prospects are improving faster than other regions,” he said.

Despite the upbeat outlook for Asia, Bisignani warned the region to press on with liberalisation or miss its growth potential.

He cited efforts by the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) regional bloc to liberalise the air sector by 2015 as an example.

“Industry is preparing and it is important that the target date is met… Asian aviation will not reach its potential if the airlines are constrained to old ways of doing business,” he said.

Source: Bangkok Post

The travel industry is pinning its hopes on healthy customer spending at the Thai International Travel Fair 2010, which it says will reflect demand and confidence in Thai tourism in 2010.

Charoen Wangananonth, the president of the Thai Travel Agents Association (TTAA), said that if spending at this year’s fair was higher than last year, the tourism outlook would be brighter.

The fair will be staged by the TTAA, the Association of Domestic Travel, Krung Thai Card (KTC), and Thai Amadeus from Feb 25-28 with 1,127 local and foreign agencies occupying 20,000 square metres at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center. Prizes worth 10 million baht will be offered to spur sales.

“We think the tourism industry should recover this year because of the global economic rebound and possible local political improvement, even if the day of judgement for former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra is approaching. We believe the time for violent incidents in Thai politics has passed and everybody wants peace,” Mr Charoen said.

The TTAA projects bookings during the four-day event will be higher than last year. Total visitors should increase to 800,000, from 500,000 last year, and spending will top 900 million baht compared to 600 million last year.

Staporn Sirisinha, the KTC senior executive vice-president for leisure marketing, said the company expected KTC card members would spend 280-300 million baht throughout the four days of the event, up from 220 million last year.

Mr Charoen said the private sector believed local tourism would gradually recover this year.

“We will meet with the minister every month to review and brainstorm ways to enhance the country’s tourism industry. This year, we want to focus promotion in China, Taiwan, Korea, and Japan,” said Mr Charoen.

He said tourists from China and Japan are returning, and bookings for the coming Chinese New Year were 50% higher than last year.

“Reservations at golf courses by Taiwanese, Koreans and Japanese have significantly increased since the start of this year,” he said, adding that at least 1 million Chinese tourists were expected to visit Thailand in 2010.

Source: Bangkok Post

The Tourism Authority of Thailand expects at least 100,000 Chinese tourists to spend the coming Chinese New Year in Thailand, up from 60,000 last year, with the easing of H1N1 flu fears and a perception in China of a calmer political situation in Thailand.

For two years Thai tourism has suffered from concern over the flu outbreak and the country’s political turmoil, especially in sensitive countries such as China, said Sansern Ngaorungsi, the executive director of the TAT’s East Asia Region.

In the coming Chinese New Year, which falls on St Valentine’s Day, the number of Chinese tourist arrivals is forecast to increase by 67% from a year earlier, he said.

But Chinese tourists are changing their behaviour by increasingly travelling on their own and using the internet to pick destinations, instead of relying on tour agents.

China has the world’s second-highest internet penetration after the United States and TAT must increase online marketing campaigns in China, he said.

The TAT recently teamed up with easynet.com, a popular tourism website, to run marketing campaigns in China, he said. It will also promote Thailand through local media in China in the first five months of this year. It expects to attract 1,000 couples from Beijing to join mass wedding ceremonies in Thailand.

Mr Sansern is seeking a budget of 60 million baht to promote Thailand in the Chinese market.

For the Chinese New Year festival, the TAT will spend about 20 million baht on promotions in major cities including Hat Yai, Phuket, Chiang Mai, Pattaya, Chon Buri, Nakhon Ratchasima and Nakhon Sawan. Grand celebrations will be held in Yaowarat, commonly known as Bangkok’s Chinatown.

Vichit Prakobgosol, the president of the Thai-Chinese Tourism Alliance Association, said Chinese tourists were returning after the association, TAT and the Ministry of Tourism and Sports seriously promoted Thailand and restored confidence throughout 2009.

At least 1.2 million Chinese tourists are expected to visit Thailand in 2010, up from fewer than 1 million last year.

Most Chinese tourists come from the south, followed by central and northern China.

Source: Bangkok Post

Asean is attempting to redefine the collaborative marketing of the region as a tourism destination with support from the United States.

A new strategy was developed after previous attempts to promote Asean as a holiday destination had poor results, said R.J. Gurley, the director of Asean Competitiveness Enhancement (ACE).

“Based on input from national tourism organisations, everyone was almost unanimous in saying that where we really need help is on branding and marketing,” he said.

ACE was set up by Nathan Associates, a consulting firm hired by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) to help the regional bloc achieve its goal of establishing the Asean Economic Community by 2015.

The ACE programme identified tourism as the second core sector for development after textiles and clothing.

The new marketing strategy focuses on attracting tourists from outside Asean to travel to the region and to visit more than one country, said Mr Gurley.

“We wanted them to stay longer and we wanted them to spend more money,” he said.

A “Visit Asean” campaign has been running for eight years with little success, he noted.

“The first thing that I did was to look at what the competition is doing. There are a number of successful regional destination marketing campaigns. There is a ‘Visit the Caribbean’, for example, where something like 22 independent island nations have joined together in marketing the Caribbean as a region.”

The South Pacific and Europe offer other examples, he said. “And in our research we felt that Europe was probably the best model for a regional campaign for Southeast Asia,” said Mr Gurley.

The European Travel Commission, founded in 1948, comprises 32 countries making it broader than the 27-member European Union. Two years ago it decided to transfer all of its marketing resources to online marketing.

“It is the most cost-effective marketing method. TV, radio and such like are just too expensive for the very limited budget that we have. With today’s internet marketing capabilities, you can do very targeted marketing and it is the most effective dollar for dollar way that you can market,” said Mr Gurley.

“Their website, visiteurope.com, shows us the difference between their model and Asean’s model. They are saying ‘Visit Europe’. They are not saying ‘Visit the European Union’.”

In 2007, the University of Queensland assessed the Visit Asean campaign and found it was largely unsuccessful because Asean is not seen as a destination.

“In fact, in the US most people have never heard of Asean. The same thing in Europe. When I tell people I’m working with Asean, they will usually say. ‘Do you mean Asia?’ As a result, if you’re a tourist in Europe and you’re thinking about coming to the region, you don’t Google ‘Asean travel’,” he said.

According to the report, the Visit Asean campaign was launched without conducting adequate market research, there was no funding for the campaign and there was no organisation to manage it.

In January 2009, the ACE project signed with the Asean Travel Association (Aseanta), to co-operatively develop a new research-based marketing strategy.

“We think it is important to brand Asean, but we should be branding Asean for what it is, which is a political, economic and social community, and have [Aseanta] be the sponsor of a Southeast Asia marketing campaign.”

The new website, southeastasia.org, will be formally launched at the Asean Tourism Forum, which runs from Jan 21-28 in Brunei. Its tagline – “Southeast Asia: Feel the Warmth” – and logo will be based on the theme of cultural diversity

and warm hospitality.

The Singapore-based firm Wego will be the website’s engine for booking flights to multi-destination packages.

While research shows that people prefer visiting faraway places, the marketing programme will initially focus on the intermediate- and long-haul market as the global recession has curbed consumer travel spending, said Mr Gurley.

ACE will be looking at Europe and Australia, and is currently assessing the Indian market. Young travellers who visit more than one country will also be targeted, along with baby boomers and retirees who have time to travel.

The ACE project is fully funded by USAID with a total budget of US$7.9 million over five years, split between textiles and apparel and tourism. ACE is planning to put $500,000 into online marketing in the first year, said Mr Gurley.

With further support from regional governments, he is confident of success.

“I have every confidence that we will have greater success than the previous campaign because we are addressing the problems identified with that campaign,” he said.

Source: Bangkok Post

Thailand could face increasing pressure in 2010 to shift exchange-rate policies in order to maintain competitiveness in the global market, says Kirida Bhaopichitr, senior economist for the World Bank in Bangkok.

Capital flows have been returning to emerging markets such as Thailand since the middle of the year, she said at a seminar held by the Iron and Steel Institute yesterday.

Fund flows have come into not only government bond markets to help finance public stimulus spending, but have also come in the form of foreign direct investments and equity flows.

The result of added capital flows into the Asian economies is added pressure for currencies in the region to appreciate.

At the same time, the US dollar is facing pressure owing to structural weaknesses in the US economy, and has fallen sharply against both the euro and the Japanese yen.

Asian economies have been intervening steadily in their currency markets to slow the pace of currency appreciation and prop up their export sectors.

“With large capital inflows and a weakening US dollar, emerging market currencies are on an appreciating trend,” Dr Kirida said.

The baht has gained 4.8% against the US dollar this year, compared with 3.65% for the Singapore dollar, 8.3% for the Korean won and 16.3% for the Indonesian rupiah. The Bank of Thailand has maintained that it will intervene in the markets only to smooth out volatility rather than seek to shift fundamental market trends.

Most analysts expect the baht to continue to appreciate over the next several months, considering the trend for a weaker dollar and Thailand’s own current account surplus, which hit an eight-month high at $2.17 billion in October. Foreign reserves have risen to $136.9 billion as of late November, compared with $111 billion at the end of 2008.

In any case, Dr Kirida said that pushing a strategy for currency depreciation would involve its own costs. While potentially helping the export sector, a weaker baht would also mean higher costs for imports, including oil, capital equipment and raw materials.

The World Bank currently projects Thai economic growth for 2010 of 3.5%, although this depends in large part on the outlook for the global economy.

Dr Kirida said even as the global recovery is tenuous, oil prices are projected to rise to average $75 per barrel next year, compared with $65 this year.

While oil prices remain far from the $130 level seen in 2008, the increase in energy costs will have a knock-on effect on other commodities, including food.

Pongnakorn Pochakorn, an economist with the Fiscal Policy Office, said the Finance Ministry maintained a base projection of 3.3% growth next year, with estimates from 2.5% to 4.1%.

The effectiveness of the Thai Khem Kaeng infrastructure investment programme will have a significant impact on growth trends in 2010, he said, with the base growth estimate based on a disbursal rate of 70% of the budget set under the spending programme.

“This is a relatively conservative target. If spending under the Thai Khem Kaeng programme increases beyond 70%, there is a chance that economic growth could rise over 3.3% next year,” Mr Pongnakorn said.

In any case, he said that 3.3% growth in 2010, while a considerable turnaround from the contraction of 3% projected this year, remains well under potential GDP growth for Thailand of 5.5% per year.

Source: Bangkok Post

The Tourism and Sports Ministry is helping Thai tourism operators and professionals prepare for increased job mobility throughout Asean from 2015.

The ministry is preparing training courses to upgrade the skills of Thai professionals to ensure they can go to work in other Asean member countries without problems.

If the curricula prove successful, Thailand may propose them as a common standard for the bloc, said permanent secretary Sasithara Pichaichannarong .

Thailand is committed to labour mobility under the Asean Framework Agreement on Services (AFAS) in 2015, when professionals from member countries will be able to work throughout the association’s grouping.

“We want to make sure that Thailand is ready to join AFAS. We aim to push our curricula to become a model for Asean community and hope they will accept it,” she said.

The ministry is now awaiting the 200-million-baht budget from the government to push forward the Asean Mutual Recognition Arrangement on Tourism Professionals (MRA) next year.

The tourism skill-enhancement curricula, to be completed by 2013, will consist of 240 courses. At present, the first four courses for bellboys, waiters, travel consultants and ticketing managers have been completed and registration will begin next year.

The ministry will work with Dusit Thani College, Eastern Asia University, and Suan Sunnandha Rajabhat University in designing the four courses.

Ms Sasithara said the ministry will also set up a MRA committee to supervise the project and certify trainees who finish the courses in the future. It will also publicise the project among tourism professionals in Chon Buri, Khon Kaen, Phuket and Chiang Mai soon.

Asean members previously signed the Asean Comprehensive Investment Agreement which came into effect early this year.

The agreement allows members to invest and open restaurants and four- and five-star hotels in member countries. They can hold up to a 51% stake in such ventures in 2010, rising to 70% in 2015.

Source: Bangkok Post

The company responsible for the beleaguered Thailand Elite Card, a scheme offering privileges to foreign visitors, confirmed that its current cardholders could continue to enjoy their privileges despite the planned shift of the company’s ownership.

Methavee Tunwattanapong, acting managing director of Thailand Privilege Card Co (TPC), said it had circulated a notification to its 2,569 members to clarify that their privileges were not suspended because the cabinet had only approved a change in the company’s management while maintaining privileges.

Thailand Elite, touted as the world’s first country privilege membership card, was launched by the Thaksin Shinawatra government in 2003.

The cards, priced at 1-2 million baht in the past and at 1.5 million baht each today, offer fast-track immigration, discounts at luxury resorts, spas and and golf courses, and many other perks aimed at increasing tourism revenue.

But after six years, the members total 2,570, and TPC, set up by the Tourism Authority of Thailand to run the scheme, has accumulated losses of 1.4 billion baht due to high payroll and management costs and also alleged abuse of privileges by executives.

The company is waiting for facts from the Interior Ministry and the Immigration Bureau to examine whether 795 of its cardholders are residing in Thailand, as the membership terms allow only visiting foreigners to enjoy the benefits.

A source said 63 cardholders were violating the membership terms because they resided in Thailand and held Thai passports, or both Thai and foreign passports.

Disqualified members would be contacted individually because the company is concerned about the impact on the country’s image and is trying to avoid legal disputes.

Ms Methavee said interest from private firms in acquiring the company would depend on the auction’s terms of reference, which are to be drafted by the National Economic and Social Development Board and the Finance Ministry.

However, the cabinet needs to consider how to handle the immigration privileges of visa issuing and fast-track immigration when ownership shifts to the private sector.

As of Nov 12, TPC had 304 million baht in cash in hand. It has monthly costs of about 5 million baht to pay for the use of limousines, golf courses and spas by its members.

Since July of this year, its sales and administration expenses have been about 10-12 million baht a month, a drop of 50% from last year.

The Elite Card recorded 1,800 members entering and departing Thailand during 2007-08 and 1,600 members during the first 10 months of this year.