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Entertainment complexes are an "unmissable opportunity" for Thailand
Strict legal and regulatory governance would be in place.
Senior officials have highlighted what they say are the significant economic benefits ECs will bring. Thailand’s government has called the proposed entertainment complexes (ECs) an “unmissable national opportunity” for job creation and boosting tourism revenues.
In a 4 June press conference in Bangkok, Suksit Srichomkhwan, deputy secretary-general to Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, said that tourism generated from the ECs could create up to 15,000 jobs and generate as much as BH200bn ($6.13b) in revenues from a wide variety of attractions.
Suksit said the ECs would include theme and water parks, multi-purpose indoor stadiums, hotels, shopping malls, cinemas, exhibition and conference centres, as well as casinos.
He stressed that online gambling would be excluded from the ECs and that the government was continuing to crack down on the sector, with more than 90,000 websites shut down and 700,000 accounts used to transfer illegally generated funds frozen.
Suksit and his fellow speaker, deputy finance minister Julapun Amornivat, said the wide range of attractions in the ECs was part of Thailand’s aim to diversify the country’s tourism offerings to widen revenue streams and attract visitors year-round, so there would no longer be a ‘low season’.
They estimated each tourist’s spend per visit would increase to BH22,300 ($684) and visitor numbers would rise by 20% annually, including 13% more visitors during the current low season.
Strict legal and regulatory governance would be in place, including entry restrictions to the casinos, mandatory registration and tracking. Safeguards would protect players from becoming problem gamblers, with rehabilitation programmes for those with significant issues.
Every EC would require a minimum investment of BH100bn ($3.07b) from the operators, and that would not include any public money. The investment would stimulate the Thai economy through the construction phase, as well as through sourcing the materials to furnish the complexes.
Suksit and Julapun’s comments were made one month before the EC legislation is due for its next reading in Thailand’s legislature.
In the same week, former Thai prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva provided a reminder of the continued opposition to the bill. Vejjajiva told a senate panel studying the proposed EC legislation that legalising casinos would not eliminate underground gambling.
As prime minister, he had rejected proposals for legal casinos because of the “real dangers” of gambling-linked crime. Vejjajiva added it was wrong to think regulated gaming would mean the end of the unregulated sector.
Vejjajiva concluded by saying that the risks posed by legalised gambling were outweighed by any possible benefits.
