Five-star Bangkok hotel's occupancy down 33%

       Among major Asian markets, Bangkok registered the most significant decline in hotel occupancy in the first half of the year, with the five-star segment at minus 28.8 per cent.
       However, the fall in average room rates appeared to have eased when compared to teh decreases of 20 per cent and more witnessed in Hong Kong, Singapore, Beijing and Shanghai, according to Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels' latest Hotel Market Intelligence seriies, which focuses on the Bangkok hotel and tourism market.
       Rate pressure is being placed across all hotel segments and in particular properties with larger room inventory. Hotels in Bangkok are reporting performance levels last seen in 1996 and 1997, and the situation is being echoed by other hotel markets in Asia.
       "The combination of the ongoing domestic political uncertainty, the strengthening baht and the golbal economic deterioration has contributed to the 21.2-per-cent year-on-year decline in Bangkok's international visitor arrivals,"said Andrew Langdon, senior vice president of Jones Lang LaSalle Hotels in Thailand.
       "We edxpect Bangkok's hotel and tourism industry to remain extremely challenging in the short term, as global as well as Asian hotel markets weather through the prevailing global financial storm. In the medium to long term, we remain positive on Bangkok's hotel and tourism outlook. Occupancy in the four-and five-star hotel segments is forecast to stay in the low-50-per-cent to low-60-per-cent range respectively over the next two years, with recovery in occupancy subject entirely to growing levels of visitor demand in order to absorb new hotel supply," he said.