Thailand to launch e-visa service phase wise

The first phase of Thailand’s e-visa service will be flagged off in the later part of 2017 and the same would be fully functional by 2018, stated Kobkarn Wattanavrangkul, Thailand’s Tourism and Sports Minister on 24 January at a press meet. According to the minister, since different ministries have to give their consent to float the e-visa, time would be taken to launch the service. For the Southeast Asian country, which played host to 32.59 million overseas tourists in 2016, e-visa service would help in making it convenient for foreign people entering its territory. David Scowsill, World Travel & Tourism Council’s President and CEO, was quoted by China News as saying during the press conference that e-visa would be one of the premier subjects of discussion at the World Travel & Tourism Global Summit 2017 which would be held in Bangkok, Thailand's capital, from 26 April to 27 April. Scowsill said that many foreign travellers still required a paper visa currently and his council was advocating governments all over the world to start accepting e-visas to make travel easier. The Global Summit will see private and public sectors’ leaders in travel and tourism from across the globe exploring the theme of  ‘Transforming our World’ and see how the contribution of this sector to sustainable development could be optimised. Kobkarn said that playing host to the global summit demonstrated the Kingdom of Thailand’s commitment to promoting their country as the leader of tourism in the Asean bloc. There was a plan to float a visa on the lines of Schengen visa for all the nations of CMVLT (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam) and discussions were ongoing, she added. If you are planning a trip to Thailand, contact Y-Axis, a leader in immigration consultancy services in India, to apply for a tourist visa from one of its several offices located in eight major cities of the country.