Tourist entry fee to Thailand proposed

Yesterday Pradit Sintavanarong, the Public Health Minister of Thailand said that related agencies are discussing a new plan to charge tourists Bt500 to enter the country for between three and thirty days and Bt30 per day if they want to stay for less than three days. He said that the plan will be proposed to the Cabinet once a conclusion has been drawn. He went on to say that since Thailand has more than 23 million foreign visitors a year this plan could bring in up to Bt10 billion in revenue. His plan is to send the money to the Finance Ministry where a specially assigned committee could allocate the funds to related agencies such as the Public Health Ministry who spend up to Bt300 million for tourist health care a year. He said that if these funds were given to the ministry they would allocate up to Bt300,000 per head in life-and-death emergency cases as well as providing more medial tools and supplies.

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