Transcript of the above video: 

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing a Schengen-like Visa here in the Southeast Asia-wide area. I've talked about this in other videos. The current Government has said that they've made it a priority to try to create this sort of 6-Nation sort of 'Schengen-like' insofar as ‘One Visa for six different countries’ sort of scheme. Now I have talked about it; people have said I may be a little bit pessimistic insofar as it's a tall order to get six different countries, especially six different Immigration bureaucracies, to sort of all start operating from the same sheet of music if you were, playing from the same sheet of music as it were. But that being said, it looks like some progress is being made on that. 

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from e.vnexpress.net, the article is titled: Vietnam, Thailand agreed to pilot 'Six Countries, One Destination' tourism initiative. Quoting directly: "Vietnam and Thailand agreed to coordinate with relevant nations to pilot..” and note pilot, Quoting further: “.. the 'Six Countries, One Destination' initiative to drive regional tourism. Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh met with his Thai counterpart Paetongtarn Shinawatra on the sidelines of the 44th and 45th ASEAN Summits and Related Summits in Vientiane, Laos, on Wednesday where the two leaders concurred to expand cooperation in potential spheres like economy and tourism." Quoting further: "Thailand earlier this year proposed a Schengen-type joint visa for itself and five other Southeast Asian countries, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Vietnam to drive regional tourism. The joint Visa would enable tourists to explore all six Southeast Asian countries on a single Visa." 

Yeah, this is a pretty ambitious sort of plan but it's not one that I think is unworthy of attention by relevant Government Authorities. If this could happen, I imagine it would cause probably a pretty significant uptick in tourism not only in Thailand but in the countries surrounding Thailand and I could see a lot of scenarios where potential tourists would say "hey why go to South America or why go to one particular country”, especially here in Southeast Asia where geographically at least, a lot of countries are rather small, especially on mainland Southeast Asia: Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam and Thailand. I mean it's pretty easy to fly between all of those jurisdictions and quite frankly it's pretty cost efficient insofar as it's not particularly expensive to fly between those places, but it can be a bit of a hassle dealing with all the visas associated with them. So I do understand and I actually think it is laudable what the Government is trying to do here in creating a sort of pan-ASEAN-wide or as close to pan-ASEAN-wide as you can get sort of Visa here in Southeast Asia.