Asia to lead the rebound once bubble resumes

The travel industry has been bearing the brunt by the Covid-19 pandemic which saw countries closing their borders to tourists earlier this year. Some markets have since reopened, but demand has been weak.

Generally, it’s been a domestic story, they are still waiting for the international [demand] to come back, according to John Brown, chief executive of Agoda. Apparently, markets like Taiwan, and Thailand, where they really have the best control over the pandemic are the markets where the domestic bookings are doing the best.

It is the domestic market that’s driving that recovery and Asia is leading the way better than in the West.

So far, Taiwan has reported 617 confirmed cases and has been free of domestic transmissions for more than 200 days, whereas Thailand and Vietnam have also been successful in containing the pandemic, with 3,920 and 1,307 confirmed cases respectively, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

In Europe and the US, there are pockets where domestic travel also looks “relatively good” despite coronavirus cases surging, according to the online travel agency. But all eyes are looking at Asia to see how they manage this both domestically, and again with regard to the travel bubble between Singapore and Hong Kong, and the many others hopefully will open up pretty soon.

Singapore-Hong Kong were set to begin quarantine-free leisure travel on November 22, but authorities announced that the travel bubble arrangement would be deferred for two weeks after Hong Kong reported a rise in cases.