During their stay in Thailand, they must take multiple Covid-19 tests and have special travel insurance. They must also download a contact tracing app allowing the authorities to keep tabs of their whereabouts.

The visits come as China’s tourism authorities expressed caution at relaxing controls on outbound tours, stressing the importance of preventing the cross-border spread of the coronavirus. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism recently said it would be extending its ban on outbound international group tours.

China and Thailand have fared relatively well in controlling the pandemic in recent months. The pandemic, which was first reported in central China in December, has spread around the world and infected more than 41 million people.

Yuthasak Supasorn, the governor of the Thailand’s tourism authority, said the Southeast Asian country was keeping an open mind on accepting foreign travellers from low-risk countries.

“During the winter season, we expect travellers from Scandinavia to arrive here in November,” he said.

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Thailand welcomed almost 40 million foreign visitors in 2019, generating 1.9 trillion baht (US$60.6 billion) but has had almost none since April.

Li Jinglei, a Chinese blogger living in Thailand, said one of his friends was among the group that arrived on Wednesday.

“Besides the pandemic, [we also had to cope with] the anti-government protests [in Bangkok] so it is unlikely that many foreign tourists would want to come now,” he said.

“[I think] the STV is an effort by the government to bring the tourists back.”

Zhuang Guotu, an international relations professor at Xiamen University, said China and Thailand were keen to get things back to normal.

“Although Covid-19 is still spreading around the world, the toxicity [of the coronavirus] is getting weaker and weaker including in Thailand,” he said.

“So the risk of Chinese travellers getting infected is low and they are unlikely to pose a problem when they return home.”

An early resumption of cross-border travel between China and Thailand was crucial for both countries as they had become increasingly connected on investment and trade in recent years, Zhuang said.

“Sino-Thai economic ties are not just about tourism, which makes up only a small portion compared to bilateral investment,” he said.

“Both China and Thailand hope that revival of tourism business will help boost the economic and trade recovery of both sides.”

According to China’s Ministry of Commerce, two-way trade between China and Thailand totalled US$80 billion in 2019. In 2018, more than 10 million Chinese tourists visited Thailand, accounting for about a quarter of all international arrivals.

Owen Zhu, who used to work as a property agent in Thailand before moving back to his hometown in south China’s Hainan province earlier this year because of the pandemic, said one of his clients would be on Monday’s flight.

The person would be travelling on a medical visa partly because the STV application was too complicated, he said.

“I hope the Thai government will relax the requirement that STV travellers have to stay in hotels for quarantine and allow them to serve out the 14-day period at home, and streamline the visa application process or it will be too daunting for people who want to apply,” he said.

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Nipon Poapongsakorn, a researcher at the Thailand Development Research Institute, said the Thai government should waive the quarantine requirement for tourists from low-risk countries like China.

“We need tens of thousands of Chinese tourists to visit Thailand. Just over 1,000 will not help with [solving Thailand’s] unemployment,” he said.

Chanapan Kaewklachaiyawuth, a vice-president of the Thai Chinese Tourism Alliance Association, said it was too early to say if the STV would help revive Thailand’s tourism business because “any single measure is not a cure-all”.

“If the two-week quarantine is cancelled, I would propose tourists should visit the doctor every three days while they are in Thailand for a check-up to create confidence and safety,” he said.