Thailand to use reality game to stimulate tourism

BANGKOK, August 1 (TNA) - The Thai Ministry of Tourism and Sports has come up with an idea on applying reality games, like Pokemon Go, to stimulate the domestic tourism in the last quarter of this year. Permanent Secretary for Tourism and Sports Pongpanu Svetarundra told journalists of the idea on Monday, saying that information technology (IT) has been playing greater role in people's daily lives, including in tourism where smart phone applications could be used to help promote the domestic tourism of all economies to woo tourists from other economies across the world. Pongpanu pointed out that most international tourist arrivals in Thailand presently are in the Foreign Individual Tourism (FIT) group, a target group using smart phones to find out popular or favourite destinations by themselves. Pongpanu noted that his ministry has, thus, joined forces with the ICT Ministry to develop new online platforms to serve the modern tourism trend, including Internet networks and applications to attract more international tourist arrivals in Thailand in order to stimulate the domestic tourism. According to the senior official, his ministry plans to launch a new application next month which would act as a personal tour guide for international tourists by providing them with access to all popular tourist destinations, restaurants and shops across Thailand with just a touch of a finger. Besides, a highlight of the domestic tourism stimulus in the last quarter of this year is his ministry's plan to include major tourist sites in Thailand in the increasingly-popular Pokemon Go reality game in a bid to attract more global visitors to the country, with talks with the company's representative in the Thai Kingdom being on progress. (TNA)