Qantas executive Stephanie Tully has been appointed the new CEO of budget airline Jetstar and will take over from Gareth Evans this November.
She is currently the group chief customer officer at Qantas. Her role at the national carrier will be replaced by Markus Svensson.
The Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) is working with a number of tourism associations on extending operating hours for attractions, especially those along the Chao Phraya River, to encourage longer stays in the Thai capital among travellers.
According to a Bangkok Post report, governor Chadchart Sittipunt said extended opening hours of the city’s tourist attractions, such as museums and temples, would not attract only foreign visitors, but also domestic tourists, to spend more time in the city.
With attractions staying open through the night, travellers can avoid the hotter times of the day and traffic congestion during the peak hours.
BMA will take public safety into consideration as it makes its plans for extended operating hours.
Meanwhile, Chadchart also revealed plans to install decorative lights around tourists attractions along the Chao Phraya River and to work with local authorities in Venice to have Bangkok declared as its twin city.
China may soon resume e-visas to allow individual Chinese residents to visit Macau and permit the sale of package tours to Macau, announced Macau’s chief executive, Ho Iat Seng, on September 24.
Ho told reporters that preparation would take at least a month, so the resumption of e-visas and package tours could be expected in late October or early November.
For a start, the package tours would be accessible to residents from Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Fujian provinces, and Shanghai. These markets represented almost 60 per cent of mainland visits to Macau in 2019.
The reopening scheme is expected to bring some 40,000 daily visitors to Macau on average.
Currently, Chinese tourists to Macau have to complete a week-long approval process.
Travellers from Hong Kong and overseas will continue to face a seven-day quarantine at a designated hotel, plus an additional three days of health monitoring.
Responsible travellers in Indonesia – defined as those who are wellness-focused, culturally-minded and care about environmental impact – want most to travel to Japan, according to YouGov’s latest report for the travel and tourism sector.
YouGov Travel Rankings 2022: Travel brands through the eyes of Responsible Travellers aims to understand how travel brands differentiate in the eyes of responsible travellers, and the brands and destinations that score higher in terms of consideration among this audience group.
YouGov Destination Index measures the public’s perception of destinations on a daily basis across a range of measures, and compiled using Consideration scores from July 2021 to June 2022.
Japan topped the list with a Consideration score of 31.2 per cent, followed by Singapore at 23 per cent and South Korea at 21.3 per cent.
Middle Eastern destinations Dubai and Saudi Arabia were the next highest ranked, with Consideration scores of 16.9 per cent and 16.8 per cent respectively. This was followed by Switzerland, the first European destination on the ranking at 12.5 per cent.
Australia (11.4 per cent) and Malaysia (9.6 per cent) were ranked seventh and eighth respectively, followed by the Netherlands (9.4 per cent) and New Zealand (9.4 per cent), which rounded off the top ten.
The full report can be found here.
Tourism Malaysia’s arts and culture ambassador and renowned chef Ismail Ahmad is leading a series of culinary presentations through Europe as part of the country’s To Know Malaysia is To Love Malaysia campaign.
It is in line with the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture and its agency, Tourism Malaysia’s efforts to promote Malaysia via its diverse gastronomy.
The campaign touched down on Serbia from September 18 to 25, sharing Malaysia’s arts, culture and culinary with the public. It will continue to Bulgaria and Germany.
The presentations showcase authentic favourites such as sate, nasi lemak, nasi ayam, mee goreng and teh tarik.
The Philippine Department of Tourism, Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE), the private sector and tourism stakeholders have successfully concluded their first Trabaho, Turismo, Asenso Philippine Tourism Job Fair over the weekend.
The first national tourism job fair kicked off on September 22 in Manila, Cebu, and Davao, putting 8,295 jobs up for grabs.
Some 5,174 applicants turned up on the launch day. As of 15.00, over 80 applicants were hired on the spot.
Tourism secretary Christina Garcia Frasco said the job fair was part of the Department of Tourism’s effort to “serve the goal of ensuring that we put our tourism stakeholders front and center of our agenda”.
She highlighted the importance of the country’s tourism industry workforce, stating that it is the tourism workers and stakeholders who “are the best representation of the Filipino brand, with your hard work, your industry, your resilience, and your graciousness, you have made known the Filipino brand of hospitality all over the world”.
How is your CEO style different from John Brown’s?
John (former CEO, now chairman of Agoda) is super smart and ‘presidential’ – he’s inclusive, approachable, the perfect CEO for Covid time as he has all the leadership qualities we needed in the crisis. I’m trying to be that, but I don’t think I’ll ever be as good as John.
Ah, but you have your own strengths. What’s the biggest?
I’ve been an entrepreneur and I grew up in tech – it’s all over me. I can talk to an engineer in a way that John probably can’t, just because I understand exactly what the engineer is saying. Not that John didn’t, but I can take it to the next level of pushing for innovation and making a difference.
What I am hearing from Booking Holdings (Agoda’s parent) is that they selected me (as CEO) because they like Agoda’s tech approach. We have a fundamental belief that we win with technology. There are lots of things to do (to succeed in the business) but in the Internet space, ultimately the winners are the ones who understand the users fastest and experiment/develop the tech fastest. That is what I stand for and one of the things I have brought to Agoda.
Tech is going to be what we live and die on in my period.
What is the one tech innovation you wish to crack?
The one that I really want to do is what I call ‘persistent’ booking.
Fundamentally, few people sit down and book their entire trip – flights, hotels, attractions, transfers, etc – at once. They may book the flight but don’t know yet where to stay, or know the hotel but can’t confirm travel dates. They may also want to book experiences later in-destination.
Where we, as an industry, have failed is to build a good enough tech to enable people to package persistently, i.e., book and build their itinerary through a period of time, in one platform that supports their travel planning and booking and, over time, gain savings because they are booking a package.
AirAsia has just launched Air Asia Holidays – flights + hotels + activities in one booking at one price – though only in Malaysia and the Philippines currently.
Yes, you can buy packages, even on Agoda, but it’s still only a minority of people in Asia that do, compared with in the US.
If you want to bring it to the masses, you need to crack the time component, make the itinerary as something that survives over time and, as time passes, people can keep adding what they need and see the savings in buying a package than individual components. We haven’t cracked this and I can tell you we will give it everything we’ve got. You’ll see a lot of movement on this from us in 2023.
We’ve just introduced a shopping cart to our platform. But that’s just the ability to add, like in an e-commerce website. That’s our first step in building a user experience where your itinerary persists through time and keeps getting package discounts.
If I can crack this, I can retire.
Why is it so difficult?
It’s a question of both tech and user experience. You can get into all sorts of problems. For instance, I book a flight and now I want to add the hotel but the booking failed. I can’t cancel the flight because it’s non-refundable.
So, we got to be smart to understand the order of how people book travel and develop interfaces such as allowing them to cancel or make amendments. Or notify a customer that they need to decide. It’s a massive technology change.
Then there are other areas such as customer support training.
The hardest thing is changing the customer behaviour. If you make it too complicated, it won’t work. It’s got to be intuitive.
But for me, this is the billion-dollar question on what separates a travel platform from a super app. Everyone wants to be a super app providing all services – kind of a WeChat. But I don’t necessarily see travel platforms becoming super apps. If anything, some super apps have become travel platforms, like Meituan, but outside China I don’t see (the concept) as being successful.
I don’t want people to buy groceries or a massage from me, unless it’s part of an experience or attraction during their travel. And if they travel with me, I want to help them build all the components through time and enjoy the discounts aggregated in the itinerary.
I think that’s enough work to do but in case it’s not, what other innovations are you toying with?
We are experimenting with a lot of services that we will be releasing in 2023. I’m very excited.
For example, price freeze. If you are afraid the rate that you’re looking at will change, pay a bit more and Agoda will lock the rate for you. If it goes down, you’ll get the cheaper price. If it goes up, the price remains as it’s been locked.
Another is a kind of insurance for when you have to cancel a booking. You pay a bit more for, say, a non-refundable room booking, which is lower-priced because it’s non-refundable, and in return Agoda will carry the risk and refund you if you have to cancel. Flexibility and the ability to cancel are really important, as we have seen during Covid.
In the B2B space, white label is a lucrative space (to double down on). We already empower the online assets and the extranet of companies such as JTB.
More interesting is distribution tech. The big chains continue to have issues with wholesale discounted rates that reach online when they aren’t supposed to. We want to provide a platform for chains to distribute to wholesalers, but with us policing the distribution so chains don’t have to play whack a mole. Also important is giving chains the visibility on where the booking goes to, to whom and ask any question they have. That open platform doesn’t exist.
Was the CEO seat your dream when joining Agoda in 2014 after selling your start-up Qlika to Booking Holdings?
I don’t think anybody – well may be some, but not me – plans to be a CEO (laughs).
I remember before Booking acquired the Israeli company, they brought us to see Rob Rosenstein (who co-founded Agoda in 2005 and served as president and CEO for more than a decade). I remember stepping into his room. He had a lot of TV screens and tons of data and I thought “Oh, this person has a tough job!”.
Definitely it wasn’t planned.
A tech-driven CEO. Should competitors worry?
Not more than they were worried with John as CEO (laughs).
We have amazing competitors. One of the values we talk a lot about at Agoda is to be humble and to me that includes acknowledging that our competitors are smart people and have their strengths. I’m not embarrassed to say – quite often we learn from them.
Travel tourism is now back in full force. According to the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines, this pent-up travel demand is driving growth in passenger traffic in this region, with airlines seeing six times more passengers in June 2022, as compared to in June 2021.
Hotel investment volume in this region is also projected to reach US$1.5 billion in 2022, a 86 per cent increase as compared to the year before.
Furthermore, South-east Asia has received over 580,000 international visitors in the first two months of 2022 alone, highlighting the revival of travel tourism.
But a question remains – as travel tourism picks up, how can the aviation and tourism industries continue to uphold strong hygiene standards to ensure everyone is able to travel safely?
Hygiene: a critical aspect of travel
Given the ongoing threat of infectious diseases that are likely to arise from emerging and existing microorganisms, implementing targeted hygiene protocols in airports and airlines, and emphasising travellers’ personal hygiene are essential. This is so as viral diseases including Monkeypox and Hand, Foot, and Mouth disease (HFMD) continue to pose a threat to the health and well-being of people.
Countries in this region are also seeing thousands of Covid-19 cases every week, as new variants emerge.
While Asia-Pacific remains a highly attractive destination for travellers in the international arena, the health and hygiene infrastructure of certain areas remains underdeveloped.
The volatility of the world we live in now, and the presence of these hygiene gaps reinforce the continuing importance for key stakeholders in the travel and aviation industries to uphold best hygiene practices to ensure that everyone can live, work and travel safely. According to a 2021 survey by Dettol across a number of regions, 77 per cent of travellers were concerned about flying due to reservations around cleanliness, and 79 per cent expect strict hygiene protocols in airlines. In another study, 40 per cent of individuals ranked hygiene as an essential factor in deciding which airline to travel in after Covid-19.
Building a stronger and healthier world
Facilitating stakeholder collaborations: As international borders open and people continue to make travelling a key priority, airports and airlines serve as critical touchpoints where viral diseases are contained and controlled. But this requires more than just a one-man effort. Multi-sectoral collaboration is paramount.
For example, during the height of Covid-19, Dettol Pro Solutions, which is popular for its science-backed hygiene solutions, partnered with prominent airlines and tourism leaders such as British Airways and Delta to boost hygiene and disinfection measures. These collaborations are crucial in boosting passengers’ confidence at a time of uncertainty, as 79 per cent of respondents cited that they are more likely to choose British Airways over other airlines after seeing this collaboration.
Such cross-sector collaborations are crucial in helping the travel industry to build customer trust quickly. Trust goes beyond just providing information. It takes a long time to develop, especially since consumer habits are always changing. It also requires consistent efforts from brands, but this can be strengthened and expedited by embarking on partnerships with stakeholders that consumers already trust.
While hygiene preparedness can be enhanced through improved coordination, communication and information-sharing between internal and external stakeholders, airports and airlines should also explore partnerships with solutions providers like technology and robotic companies to create autonomous commercial cleaning systems. In past years, digitalisation has undoubtedly transformed industries worldwide, and this includes the aviation and tourism industries. Adopting new technologies are beneficial, as it helps to replace manual tasks and circumvent the shortage of manpower by making cleaning more efficient and cost-effective.
Providing targeted hygiene as an efficient and sustainable option: Besides stakeholder collaboration, it is also important for airlines and airports to adopt a targeted hygiene approach to ensure the efficacy and sustainability of measures.
Known as a risk-based approach where hygiene interventions are put into place when and where they are most effective, targeted hygiene includes frequent sanitisation of high touchpoint surfaces, and ensuring that passengers are wearing face masks. Since it focuses on key areas to break the potential chain of infection, targeted hygiene avoids wastage of valuable resources and manpower.
For example, at COP26 last year, one such initiative based on the targeted hygiene approach was implemented to protect all attendees. These protocols helped to reduce the spread of illness-causing germs across 50,000 hotspots in the large conference space.
Towards a new era in travel and tourism
Today, the world is gradually (but surely) finding its footing back in a post-Covid era. People are venturing out to visit new places and travel tourism is back on track. To ensure that everyone is able to live, work and travel safely in this new normal, following proper hygiene methods and upholding personal cleanliness to reduce the spread of infections is paramount.
As international borders open and travel picks up in the region, it will take the continued efforts of key stakeholders to strengthen hygiene standards and ensure that the aviation and travel industries are ready to tackle any new challenges, so that passengers are always able to travel safely. Only by doing so can ASEAN become a desired tourist destination.
ASEAN has issued a statement ahead of World Tourism Day to emphasise the region’s tourism recovery, with hotel searches, occupancy rates and travel confidence rising.
According to ASEAN, tourism growth is already “on the incline” in 4Q2022. Quoting UNWTO’s Tourism Recovery Tracker, ASEAN also pointed to a 28 per cent year-to-date increase in South-east Asia hotel searches as well as a 57 per cent increase in occupancy rates.
Overall travel sentiment has also risen by an impressive 40 per cent year-to-date, and it is expected to increase as more Covid-19 vaccines become available across the globe and variants of Covid-19 become milder. ASEAN noted that this progression has led to easing of the regions’ pandemic-related border restrictions.
ASEAN said “the pandemic should serve as an impetus and opportunity for the sector to…build forward better – by designing and building a more sustainable tourism sector that would underpin its resilience, which should no longer be taken for granted”.
“The vision is for tourism in ASEAN to emerge more sustainable and resilient following the crisis induced by Covid-19, with more focus on environmental conservation and climate friendly policies, as well as on the critical socio-cultural impacts of the tourism sector in the region,” noted ASEAN in its statement.
The association also spotlights the region’s tourism tagline, A Destination for Every Dream, as it recalls South-east Asia’s blend of “perfect experiences”.
It said: “No other tourism region offers a unified destination so close in the distance and rich in culture, historical sites, varying cuisines, natural landscapes, ecotourism, modern metropolises, and adventure activities.”
Five of the ASEAN member states were listed in Forbes’s recent article, The World’s 50 Most Beautiful Countries, based on their inherent natural beauty and the availability of nature-based activities for guests and natives.
The article listed Indonesia first out of 50 destinations, and Raja Ampat Island in particular as the most beautiful place on earth.
The Philippines ranked 17th on the list; Malaysia at 24th; Thailand at 38th; and Myanmar at 41st.
With new Covid-19 infections falling to an all-time low over the last two months, the South Korean government has fully lifted outdoor mask mandates today.
Prior to this, mask-wearing was still required at outdoor gatherings involving 50 or more people.
According to news reports, the government has expressed intentions to progressively ease low-risk restrictions, subject to the guidance of experts.
For now, the country’s mask mandate will remain for indoor environment, due to possible risks of seasonal influenza and other infectious diseases, said officials.