The 66th TAAI Convention was held aboard the Spectrum of the Seas of Royal Caribbean from August 22-25, off the coast of Singapore (Photo: India Outbound)
With long-haul travel struggling to return to the pre-pandemic levels around the world, a number of destinations have not only started looking at promoting domestic tourism, but more keenly travel from source markets in the region or a 5-6 hour flight away. Hence, it was rather apt that promoting regional travel the underlying theme of the 66th TAAI Convention that was held aboard the Spectrum of the Seas of Royal Caribbean from August 22-25, off the coast of Singapore.
The convention was attended by over 300 members of Travel Agents Association of India (TAAI), India’s largest and oldest travel trade body, as well as media and representatives of tourism departments of several Asian countries and airlines. The Guest of Honour for the inauguration of the convention was P Kumaran, High Commissioner of India to Singapore, who set the tone of the meeting by speaking about the importance of regional tourism and how the event could be a platform to promote travel from South-East Asia to India and vice-versa.
Indeed, in many ways, how various countries in South and South-East Asia can benefit from promoting regional tourism was the underlying theme of several sessions that were held as part of the convention programme.
The first session “War, Peace & Tourism” showcased why regional tourism was the key in the short-term, at least. One of the factors inhibiting the full-fledged return of long-haul tourism, besides limited air capacity, visa delays as well as inflation, is the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, which has led to closure of airspace that is vital for efficient connectivity between India and Europe, and which has also disrupted wider travel from around the world due to rerouting of aircraft that pushes the costs even further.
TAAI President Jyoti Mayal also emphasises the growing importance of regional tourism and how the travel trade can easily and immediately encash this opportunity that has been staring at them for a while. She says that was the primary reason for focusing on regional tourism, which was one of the key themes of the convention, besides promoting cruise tourism in India, which is yet another segment with immense and immediate business opportunities for the travel trade.
“Regional tourism is an aspect which I have been actually supporting. Our borders don’t need to be closed, another Covid or no Covid, pandemic or no pandemic, we need to keep our borders open so that we can continue tourism. Like I say let India be one state and let the regions be one India. So let us move forward with that thought and see how can we make tourism policies better, so that more people can travel, how can visas be facilitated. May be even how can we have one visa and one tourism policy, one tax structure for tourism only,” Mayal told India Outbound at the convention.
‘‘Tourism is the only thing that can keep every country alive and we need to build on these strengths, and we have everything in this region to encash on and the opportunities are huge. We should not be missing it. We missed the opportunity of making India a very big hub 15-20 years back when it could have been the largest hub of air travel and other countries encashed on it. And I think its still time as again we are on ground zero and we need to build all our opportunities all our businesses again and this is the right opportunity to start building again,’’ Mayal added.
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Putting their money where their mouth was TAAI had invited representatives of India’s neighbouring countries –Nepal, Sri Lanka and Kazakhstan – to meet with the agents, address the convention and highlight their own strategies to promote regional tourism. Indeed, in the spirit of regional tourism, the cruise headed to Malaysia, where Penang Tourism hosted a special event for the visitors.
Connected traveller, technology in tourism
Another major topic of discussion was the ongoing struggle in the global travel industry in finding the right balance between the use of technology and human interface vis a vis customers. At the convention, there was general consensus that the pandemic has led to a dramatic acceleration in adoption of technology and even ending human interface in some aspects of travel, notably vis a vis touchless transactions or actions like automated boarding or immigration gates.
Indeed, one of the sessions was ‘The Connected Traveller’ where spokespersons of airlines, hotels and cruise companies broadly agreed that while there was scope to integrate more technology to make some aspects of travel seamless, faster and easier for the travellers, the vital need for human interface at key points during preparation of the travel and even during the travel. While some speakers highlighted how they were using advanced technology like facial recognition to make customer experience better, others raised the issue of intrusive technology and lack of respect of privacy without adequate safeguards to protect the users.
Mayal says the travel trade needed to adopt technology to keep abreast with the customer needs and expectations, which have undergone large-scale changes since the outbreak of the pandemic. Mayal says that technology represented an opportunity more than a challenge. “Post-pandemic the times have changed things need to be looked at differently. The traveller is looking for experiences, he is not only looking for the run of the mill that the travel agent has been used to doing. They need to change the way of working if they want to hold their businesses. It is very easy to blame people and say that there is no business, there is enough business in the market. As a matter of fact post-Covid there are many new streams that have come in and many new avenues that have come up and people need to utilise this and people need to take this opportunities from the crisis,’’ says Mayal.
Another aspect of tourism that has not been adequately explored by Indian travel trade and which was showcased at the convention was cruise tourism, both inbound and outbound. Mayal says that while Indian agents could sell more cruises in South-East Asia in the spirit of regional tourism, to make India a cruise-tourism destination, the government needed to take some steps and urgently.
‘‘For cruising we have more than 7000 km of coastline and it is underdeveloped. Our ports are lying raw and they are not even utilised to 1 pc of their potential. The government needs to work quickly on it to say how we can connect the country from east to west to move forward,’’ says Mayal.
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With a lot of work and some fun activities at the convention, Mayal says that she was happy with the outcome of the convention. ‘‘The 66th cruising convention has been a success in terms of number, in terms of participation, in terms of knowledge sessions, in terms of sponsorships, in terms of people wanting to illuminate their minds. Looking at the change demography of a traveller, a changed demography of a destination, the evolved traveller, the connected traveller and that is what we discussed about where we are moving today and to the future,’’ she concludes.
