ASEAN NTOs scratching for cash
January 18, 2011 by Don Ross
Filed under News, Southeast Asia
PHNOM PENH, 18 January 2011 – ASEAN national tourism offices will need to source at least US$6 million to fund projects outlined in the ASEAN Tourism Strategic Plan, but until they can tap “public and private partnerships” they will have to get by with just US$50,000 approved at their meeting Monday.
It was exactly a year ago when USAID announced at the ASEAN Tourism Forum it was underwriting the cost of the five year strategic plan as well as the development and management of an expensive and sophisticated ASEAN website www.southeastaisa.org.
ASEAN tourism on a shoestring
January 10, 2011 by Imtiaz Muqbil
Filed under Blogs, Imtiaz Muqbil, Southeast Asia
BANGKOK, 10 January 2011 – An ASEAN Tourism Strategic Plan (ATSP) to be submitted for approval at a meeting of the ASEAN tourism ministers in Cambodia later this month has reinforced the widely-known root cause of the region’s tourism marketing and promotional problems – a critical shortage of funds.
Developed by the College of Innovation, Thammasat University, in consultation with the ASEAN national tourism organizations, ASEAN tourism private sector groups and other external consultants, the plan repeatedly cites the funding shortage as a serious impediment to its implementation over the 2011-2015 five-year period.
Mekong website faces delays
September 14, 2010 by Rapeepat Mantanarat
Filed under Mekong Region, Technology
BANGKOK, 14 September 2010 – Delays in the remake of the Mekong Tourism Coordinating Office’s website, Exploremekong.org, has pushed the launch date to the ASEAN Tourism Forum 2011 to be held, 15 to 21 January, in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.
It was originally set for a consumer launch, last June, during the Thailand Travel Mart, but even though the mart was postponed to September, the USAID funded remake still fell behind a revised schedule.
Burmese tale wins website prize
August 16, 2010 by TTRweekly Staff
Filed under News
BANGKOK, 16 August 2010 – A travel story on the ancient city of Bagan in Myanmar won the “People’s Grand Prize” in a competition run by the website www.southeastasia.org; a project wholly funded by USAID.
The competition was managed by ACE (Advance Competitiveness Enhancement) under a five-year project supported by the US agency. It moved into top gear, earlier this year, with the launch of the campaign “Southeast Asia: Feel the Warmth.” A key component is the consumer website designed to promote travel to ASEAN’s 10 member countries and offering a one-stop shop on its homepage with a booking and payment capability on airline, travel and hotel services.
Burma connection threatens USAID funding
WASHINGTON, 10 August 2010 ― USAID funding for a project that gave ASEAN a tourism website and campaign “Southeast Asia: Feel the Warmth” is under review following criticism that it may have a commercial value for Myanmar and break strict US sanctions.
A source in the US capital confirmed that “a review of the funding is going on to determine whether the project violates Burma sanctions, but a conclusion hasn’t been reached yet.”
Free websites up for grabs
March 29, 2010 by Imtiaz Muqbil
Filed under Blogs
The tourism component of the ASEAN Competitiveness Enhancement (ACE) project, funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), yielded yet another poor result last week when a presentation to the Association of Thai Travel Agents was hit by a low turnout of members.
Only 200 of the association’s 1,300 members turned up to hear a pitch on how they could sign up for free websites and low-cost online booking transactions, listened politely and then left the lunch meeting without publicly asking a single question. Read more
USAID denies it broke sanctions
USAID denies it has violated either the letter or spirit of US legislation on aid to Myanmar by funding the ASEAN Competitiveness Enhancement (ACE) Project, according to the agency’s communications director, Hal Lipper.
He was responding to a US Campaign for Burma’s statement that claimed the project would be challenged by Congress and might have to be reviewed.
Earlier in the month, Washington-based US Campaign for Burma advocacy director, Jennifer Quigley, told TTR Weekly: “To my knowledge, Congress is aware of this project and I believe they may require USAID to change the project as a result of this violation.” Read more
ATTA members urged to go B2C
March 26, 2010 by Chanida Sa-ngiamphaisalsuk
Filed under News
A new website and campaign to promote tourism to the 10 member countries of ASEAN will help traditional travel agencies to tap a B2C sales channel, according to Association of Thai Travel Agents vice president, Nino Jotikasthira.
He was presenting details of the recently launched www.southeastasia.org campaign, funded by USAID and managed through the US consultancy firm Nathan Associates Inc, to around 200 travel agents attending the ATTA annual general meeting yesterday.
Congress may challenge USAID project
The USAID funded ASEAN Competitive Enhancement project, by promoting Myanmar, breaches the rules on how it is allowed to disburse funds and must be changed if Congress intervenes.
That’s the view of a leading Myanmar expert in Washington, US Campaign for Burma advocacy director, Jennifer Quigley, who told TTR Weekly: “To my knowledge, Congress is aware of this project and I believe they may require USAID to change the project as a result of this violation.”
The US$8 million ACE project aims to build commercial competitiveness in ASEAN’s tourism and textiles industries. Approximately, US$4 million of the 2008 to 2013 ACE budget goes to a tourism marketing campaign called “Southeast Asia: Feel the warmth” that is built around a consumer website that will drive tourist bookings to the 10 countries of ASEAN, of which Myanmar is a member.
US project grabs Mekong website
March 17, 2010 by TTRweekly Staff
Filed under News
A new verison of the website www.exploremekong.org, the consumer site owned by Mekong Tourism Coordinating Office (MTCO), will be modelled almost a carbon copy of the website recently developed for ASEAN’s new tourism marketing brand Southeast Asia: Feel the Warmth.
It involves the same players behind the controversial SoutheastAsia.Org website with almost identical financial support from USAID until 2013. The project is supervised by the Asean Competitiveness Enhancement project through a contractor Nathan Associates Inc.
