Almost half a million Russians visited Thailand in the first quarter

According to the results of the first quarter of 2017, Thailand was visited by almost 489 thousand tourists from Russia. Thus, the Russians took the third place in the list of fans of Thai resorts. These data are based on the statistics of the Immigration Bureau of the country, which monitors the passage of foreigners through the border control points. It is noteworthy, that it was the Russia that showed the highest growth rates of tourist traffic in the first quarter. Against the previous year, the number of Russians visiting Thailand increased by 36.55% (in the first quarter of 2016 - slightly more than 358 thousand). Earlier, the Head of the marketing department of the Moscow office of the Tourist Board of Thailand (TAT) Konstantin Kinel said, that the department expects about 1 million tourists from Russia in 2017, that is, not less than in 2016. At the same time, statistics of Thai experts show, that the Russians have changed their geographical preferences. If previously the main "Russian" resort was budget Pattaya, in 2016 - Russians were choosing a more expensive Phuket, which hosted about half of all trips from Russia to Thailand.