Alex Jenson 0:08
You’re listening to koreabizcast with the KBLA. It is Monday, March 21. And despite a huge peak in the last few days on the COVID-19 front, this country is exempting vaccinated individuals arriving from overseas for mandatory quarantine. As of today, it’s being widely welcomed, of course, by the travel industry, this move, that has been an area that’s been hit very hard by the pandemic. That’s now into the third year less we remind ourselves, let’s first take a look at how the pandemic has impacted tourism in Korea and take it from there in this conversation. I can welcome on the line. Kyungmi Choi, our special issues reporter now, taking on a new topic post election coverage, and well done for all that, by the way can mean?

Kyungmi Choi 0:58
Well, thank you so much for allowing me to talk about the election. And now about tourism industry.

Alex Jenson 1:05
Yeah, it was a really dramatic election, by the way, as well. One of the most dramatic conclusions in recent history anywhere. But according to the government here. The tourism industry has seen some major financial damage over the past two years. So we’ve talked about this year three being a bit more optimistic. Let’s set that in context. First of all.

Kyungmi Choi 1:26
So Korea’s tourism industry saw financial damage of 16.6 trillion won in the past two years due to the spread of the Coronavirus. And the sector’s overall sales has decreased by 62% Compared to 2019, which is of course before the onset of the pandemic. And it’s also led to 4000 jobs being lost in the sector. And naturally that says affected both inbound and outbound travel. And according to the Bank of Korea, or the country’s deficit and travel account was 6.2 3 billion US dollars last year. And this reflects how many people found it difficult to travel abroad during the pandemic. Also, this travel account deficit shows the amount of overseas tourist spending that exceeds spending spent by our domestic travelers. And it was slightly from the $5.82 billion recorded in the previous year. But it was around half the amount compared to pre pandemic days. And the figure went above $10 billion from the first time in 2015 and has stayed above that figure until 2019. And as for people visiting Korea, only 212,000 travelers visited Korea for tourism purposes last year. This was 12.8% of the figure recorded in 2020 and only 1.5% Compared to 2019. And as for travel businesses in Korea, around 1000 of them shut down in 2020. And the figure grew even further to over 1400 last year.

Alex Jenson 2:56
And the tourism sector, Kyumgmi has voiced complaints about the government’s lack of support for the industry throughout the pandemic.

Kyungmi Choi 3:03
Right so most recently traveled businesses were excluded from the government’s compensation program for small businesses that saw losses due to antivirus measures. In the businesses argue that the travel industry is one of the sectors that was hit the hardest by the pandemic. But the government has fallen short of coming up with practical and fair measures. And one of the pledges for the tourism sector by President Elect Yoon Sukyeol is to include the sector in the compensation program. So we’ll have to see whether that materializes once he takes office. And businesses also say that the government should draw up a special budget dedicated to quarantine measures in the tourism sector. And of this, the businesses also demanded the government to extend the designation of the travel industry for providing its special employment retention support program. And the government has been providing stipends to businesses so their employees can go on paid leaves rather than being let go. And this measure has been implemented from early 2020. And it’s been explained or extended a few times due to the prolonged pandemic. But it’s set to expire at the end of this month. So the industry is demanding the government to extend it further until the end of the pandemic.

Alex Jenson 4:18
But relatively recently, the government did sign two agreements to allow fully vaccinated people to travel without having to quarantine that, in its own way raised some hopes of helping to revive the tourism industry. Right.

Kyungmi Choi 4:31
So back in July last year, Korea launched its first travel bubble program with Saipan, and it was the first quarantine free international travels for all Koreans amid the pandemic. So travelers were exempt from quarantine upon arrival at their destination as well as after returning home and they had to present our negative test result and vaccination certificate. And under the agreement was upon fully vaccinated travelers had to go on group tours or rather than being allowed to travel according to their individual itineraries, and they also have to stay at designated hotels. Also, this was with the aim of helping the tourism sector while also minimizing our virus risks, and Korea signed its second agreement with Singapore in the program kicked off in November, and new ticket sales to Singapore were suspended temporarily or not too long after the program launched or from late December. This was to prevent the spread of the omicron variant, all while people who purchase their tickets before the new restrictions could still travel under the program. Thankfully, this restriction was lifted in late January. And according to the Korean government, the number of people who took flights to Saipan and Singapore after the launch of the travel bubble increased by 10 and 5 times respectively, compared to before the signing of the agreements. And in the case of Singapore, the accumulated number of people who took flights there from November last year to February this year, was 66,000. And the number of people who traveled using the travel bubble program as a whole top 100,000 over the past weekend,

Alex Jenson 6:10
But starting today won’t be just travelers to and from Saipan and Singapore that will be exempt from self isolation. And this is a game changer. I’ve been receiving messages from people overseas are quite excited about this. Although at the same time seeing Korea’s infection numbers, maybe a little confused, remind us exactly how the rules will change from today. Or maybe just clarify for people who are confused about it. Sometimes the Korean language information is a lot more detailed than what we see in English.

Kyungmi Choi 6:40
Right. So just to remind you how the visual has been implemented so far. Starting in December 3 of last year, the government had required all travelers regardless of the nationality to quarantine for seven days, and this was in an effort to stop the spread of the omicron variant. But starting today with this change, fully vaccinated Koreans and foreign visitors arriving from overseas will be exempt from mandatory self isolation of seven days. And those considered fully vaccinated here are people who have received three vaccine shots, or two doses with the second one being inoculated fewer than 180 days prior to entry. And people who are vaccinated in Korea will have their records automatically registered in the Korean quarantine information system called Q- code. But for those who received their shots abroad, they have to register their vaccination records at our public health center in Korea by bringing a vaccination proof and a copy of their ID.

Alex Jenson 7:41
So not entirely hassle free, but at least it’s not a blanket situation that affects all people who were vaccinated abroad, which was a major concern earlier in the pandemic. And we should point out that there will still be quarantine regulations in place.

Kyungmi Choi 7:59
People who are unvaccinated or they still have to quarantine even if they recover from COVID-19. And even if they couldn’t get vaccinated for medical reasons, and anyone who enter the country before today, they still need to complete the full seven days of quarantine and exceptions will also apply to those coming in from Pakistan. Uzbekistan, Ukraine and Myanmar, and other people who need to quarantine include children are under the age of 12. And the government explained that the decision to live quarantine was made as the number of important cases accounted for less than 0.1% of daily infections. And additional changes will take place starting in April as well. People who are inoculated abroad can submit their vaccination records or directly on the Q code system without having to visit public health centers. And not only that, visitors will be allowed to take public transportation from the airport to their destinations, instead of only being allowed to take quarantine taxis, buses or using their own vehicles.

Alex Jenson 9:02
I can’t help pausing when you mentioned Ukraine. It’s not like people arriving from that country just coming here on holiday you would imagine but that’s one extra hoops for them to jump through on arrival. Of course South Korea has banded travel to Ukraine anyway. And maybe it’s a whole other industry topic that affects a whole range of sectors that we could pick up on another time. But this change, generally across the board is being welcomed by the tourism industry as we’ve suggested. Can we go a little further into that response?

Kyungmi Choi 9:35
Yes, so the number of bookings for overseas trips increased immediately following this news. According to a major local booking platform, Interpark tour, overseas flight reservations from March 11 are this is when the government announced the change or to march 13 increased by over 870% on year and 280% compared to the previous month and by in different regions around 40% of the bookings accounted for the Americas, followed by 31% in Europe and 19% in Southeast Asia, and a major travel agency, yellow balloon tour, says that the number of new members on its website went up by 50% from March 11 to the 14th. And the number of reservations also jumped by 100%. And another travel agency, Hana tour, says that it started receiving more inquiries related to honeymoon destinations, such as Cancun and Hawaii from the April to June period in the industry as a whole expects demand to increase in earnest starting in May, as it will take some time for airline companies to resume their flights. And as Korea is still struggling with its current omicron wave. Meanwhile, the industry says that the government has to take additional actions to normalize overseas travel. One major demand is for the government to relax its rules on testing for travelers. Currently people who hope to travel overseas, they have to submit negative PCR test results before departure. And they’re also required to take two tests upon returning home. And some countries like most European nations don’t require this procedure. Also there the travel industry is demanding that we follow the example of these countries. And in addition, travelers need to submit various documents such as vaccination proof, special quarantine report and health questionnaire. And the industry argues that the overall procedure has to be simplified to further revive all tourism.

Alex Jenson 11:33
You kind of want to limit those hoops as much as possible the hassle on arrival. It’d be nice for people to be able to have their vaccinations recognized, for example, digitally before they travel. But how is the airline industry in particular responding?

Kyungmi Choi 11:47
So the industry has also been suffering amid this prolonged pandemic, and around 90% of international flights have reportedly been grounded. And last year, major airliners all suffered losses or with Jeju error seeing an operating loss of 323 billion won. Jin Air saw 194 billion won in losses and Tway Air and Air Pusan also saw 157 billion and 204 billion won in operating losses respectively, and Korean Air was actually able to achieve an annual surplus but this was due to its cargo business. And it’s all passenger business saw sales of 1.83 trillion won. This was down by over 80% from 2019. Also, the change in quarantine rules is definitely raising hopes that it’ll lead to resumption in flights and an increase in passengers as well.

Alex Jenson 12:40
The transition team already unveiled by President Elect Yoon Sukyeol got this COVID situation looming large, they’ve already spoken about tackling the crisis. There is some hope though in the tourism sector, broadly speaking that the deregulation attitude already expressed by Yun might be of help here. Let’s remind ourselves of some of his pledges for the industry when he was a candidate only.

Kyungmi Choi 13:07
So you can pledge to provide financial support to the tourism industry through loans and stipends at times of disasters such as breakouts of infectious diseases, and he has also voted to provide a social safety net for all workers in the sector, as well as damage compensation for the travel industry as I mentioned earlier, and units pointed out that tourism related policies are inconsistent as they’re overseen by different government departments. So he has vowed to establish an independent tourism office under the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, which can act as a control tower for the tourism sector and would be located in Jeju. But it remains unclear whether this pledge can be implemented as it would require a revision of the Government Organization Act. And Yoon had also supported the lifting of mandatory self isolation for travelers to Korea as a candidate, so that’s also expected to be maintained under his administration. And there’s also possibility that he could lift the foreign ministry’s special advisory organs overseas travel, which calls for Koreans to cancel or postpone their trips, or this has been in place since March of 2020. And this was something the industry has been demanding, saying that the government was sending mixed messages by maintaining this advisory, while exempting or mandatory quarantine for overseas arrivals. So following Yoon’s election, the tourism sector has also demanded for him to present more detailed measures that can directly help support the industry and also create a travel friendly environment rather than announcing ones that focus on cash handouts and financial support.

Alex Jenson 14:48
Yeah, there’s different levels of advisory there on there compared with the all out band for South Korean citizens from traveling to Ukraine, which I referenced earlier. And by the way, which has become quite an issue for the Ex Navy SEAL turned YouTuber, Reagan or Egan spelt with a R in English but very much pronounced Lee in Korean. He went to Ukraine to help fight along with two associates, the two associates have returned to Korea and are subject to questioning by police after a foreign ministry complaint it sounds all rather complex, again, a whole other topic but reflective of of a genuine travel ban situation rather than just an advisory against travel. But what you said before for example, can we about the PCR tests, I mean, for many countries, it’s very expensive to get to PCR tests before traveling. And that’s definitely something that’s gonna have to be looked at. It’s not like the horse hasn’t already bolted here in Korea with the numbers we’ve been seeing recently. And perhaps these numbers are what the country is needed to get over this, despite the grim reality for many families of the tragedies involved, just by sheer weight of cases, even if the mortality rate has been just over point 1%. I think that covers just about everything for the tourism sector, there generally can be so thank you very much for taking the time.

Kyungmi Choi 16:11
Well, thank you for having me as always.

Alex Jenson 16:15
And also, as always, if you want me to look into something of particular interest to you, you can get in touch on LinkedIn, search KBLA or you can email us info@kbla.net otherwise, see you again tomorrow.