Risk & Crisis Management in Tourism Sector:
Recovery from Crisis
in the OIC Member Countries
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and tourism). No figures are available for the amount of money allocated for promotion and
marketing.
One of the principal ‘tried-and-tested’ strategies is for businesses normally reliant on long-haul
markets to turn instead to domestic and regional markets. The TAT started doing this as early as
2002/3, when arrivals from traditional Western markets to Southeast Asia weakened generally in
the wake of the bombings of two nightclubs in Indonesia’s principal holiday destination of Bali in
October 2002. At that period the TAT initiated the ‘Thai teow thai’ campaign, which roughly
translates as ‘Thais go on holiday in Thailand’ (Richards, pers. comm., 6 April 2017), while in 2008,
the government worked with the private sector to organize a ‘Thai Travel Fair’ and reduce the
prices of local flights and hotel accommodation, which increased the quantity and frequency of
domestic travel (World Economic Forum, 2015).
In common with other Asian countries, Thailand also began to market itself much more strongly to
neighbouring countries, taking advantage of economic growth rates across the region and the
expanding middle class. Cultural factors have to be taken into account, however: Campiranon and
Arcodia (2008) found that after the 2004 tsunami Asian tourists avoided affected destinations
because they were afraid of ghosts, due to the large number of people killed in the disaster, while
on the other hand Western volunteers flocked to the affected destinations to help with the
rebuilding process and to support local businesses.
A study of hotels in Phuket by Campiranon and Scott (2014) and of responses to political crises in
Thailand by Kanlayanasukho (2014) demonstrated that policies implemented by managers to
recover from crises fell into 5 categories:
1. A crisis management plan already in place which could be quickly tailored to different
types of crises, e.g. economic, political, or disease outbreaks, with customer safety
prioritised through information and ensuring their relocation to a place of safety,
including evacuation out of the country if necessary.
2. Thorough understanding of markets and targeting of appropriate markets and market
segments in different circumstances. So, during the global financial crisis, hotels in
Phuket concentrated more on markets closer to home than on long-haul visitors.
3. Issuing special discounted rates or adding value to their products, using phrases such as
“affordable luxury” to encourage a continued flow of visitors.
4. Collaborating with other providers along the supply chain in order to reduce negative
perceptions and create value-added packages.
5. Reducing staff costs by measures such as giving staff reduced hours or unpaid leave:
managers reported that these measures were reasonably well supported by employees
if the situation was clearly communicated to them.
At a micro-level, a study of tourism enterprises in Phuket by Biggs et al (2012) concluded that
informal enterprises (i.e. small-scale, self-employed entrepreneurs) were more resilient than
formal ones (i.e. licensed, taxation registered businesses) and recovered more quickly from the
decline in visitors occasioned by the tsunami in 2004 and the financial crisis in 2009.