Joint Thai-Bhutan tourism project eyed
THAILAND and Bhutan are considering launching a “Two Kingdoms One Destination” tourism project with talks possibly being held during Thai-Bhutan Festival taking place in the Himalayan kingdom next March, Thai News Agency quoted Deputy Prime Minister Thanasak Patimaprakorn as saying today.
The Thai Deputy Premier, who spoke after meeting Bhutanese Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay, added that the March festival in Bhutan will also show various facets of Thai and Bhutanese culture and display Thai boxing style.
This tourism cooperation between Thailand and Bhutan, which is known as the Land of Thunder Dragon, is also aimed at promoting the two countries globally and talks might focus on tax levied on Thai tourists which is still quite high,
General Thanasak added that while a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on tourism had been signed between the two countries, it had not made a lot of progress. However, recently another MOU was signed between the two countries to boost cooperation in sports, particularly golf, with Thailand sending teachers to teach the skills of this sport.
Bhutan’s Premier had told General Thanasak that some of his country’s policies follow the Thai prototype such the Otop project which the Bhutanese Queen Jetsun Pema personally supervises the development in various areas of their kingdom.
Thailand has also been helping Bhutan in various ways such as sending wood carvers to help with their Otop project, volunteers to teach various types of packaging and Thai graduates in architecture and IT as well as Thai language teachers have gone there in rotation to teach.
“People here are like Thai people smiling,cheerful greeting each other. The geography is like northern Thailand, and even though they only have a population of 700,000 but their greatness is in their kindness similar to Thai people,” General Thanasak said.
CAPTIONS:
Top: Paro Taktsang is the popular name of Taktsang Palphug Monastery (also known as Tiger’s Nest), a prominent Himalayan Buddhist sacred site and temple complex, located on the cliffside of the upper Paro valley in Bhutan. Photo: Arian Zwegers (CC-BY-2.0)
Inset: School children from Wangdi Phodrang in Bhutan. Photo: Sankara Subramanian (CC-BY-2.0)
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