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Phuket booms, but infrastructure worries grow
Phuket’s hospitality market is being driven by an 11% surge in airport arrivals in the first six months of 2012 for a total of 2.32 million passengers, according to the Phuket Mid-Year Hotel Update report by hospitality consulting firm C9 Hotelworks.
The wave of tourists has seen the destination chalk up 75% hotel occupancy island wide and a January to June RevPAR (revenue per available room) rise of 8%.
A rise in direct international flights in particular is setting the stage for a record high 9.3 million passengers to travel through the airport this year.
C9 Hotelworks managing director Bill Barnett said new airlift from Mainland China, Russia, plus the massive pick up in regional low-cost carrier flights, is driving a new era of mass tourism to the island.
Top growth markets are China, Eastern Europe and Malaysia growing at 66%, 33% and 17% respectively versus the same period last year, according to the report.
Barnett warned, however, that mass tourism "is the elephant in the room of every major resort destination in Asia and the island continues to face both a mounting infrastructure dilemma and lacks a clear-cut long-term tourism plan".
"This can perhaps be best demonstrated by the delayed upgrade plans at the gateway Phuket International Airport.
"With the expansion plan now expected to be completed by 2015, assuming an average annual growth rate of 5%, the expanded airport would hit capacity by 2017.
"Essentially, this equates to a scenario of a new facility being dead on arrival, Barnett said.
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