To no one’s surprise, S’pore has SEA’s most powerful passport. And the rest?

COVID-19 restrictions have loosened (for the most part) and borders are reopening. This means people can finally resume all their long-planned vacations after a very long two-and-a-half years grappling with on-again/off-again lockdowns and the crippling anxiety of getting infected with the virus. Sure, COVID-19 isn’t gone, but it’s safe to say we’ve kind of gotten used to having it around.

A sense of endemicity, if you will. And with that, people are beginning to book more flights to places they’ve always wanted to explore. But as we know, not all passports are made equal.

Some are far more powerful than others, while a select few nations might as well not travel at all considering how weak their passports are. London-based investment migration consultancy, Henley & Partners, has released their annual Passport Index, ranking the world’s passports based on the number of visa-free destinations their respective holders can visit. The rankings are tabulated based on exclusive and official data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

In 2022, the top three most powerful passports are all from Asian nations. To absolutely no one’s surprise (and if you’ve already read the headline), Singapore has the most powerful passport in Southeast Asia (192 destinations) – but not globally. In fact, Singapore is second place, with Japan (193) taking the top spot as the most powerful passport in the world.

Sharing second place with Singapore is South Korea. Now that we’ve established the top three, what about the rest of Southeast Asia? How strong (or weak) are their passports? Malaysia is the next Southeast Asian nation to follow Lion City, ranked in 13th place with 179 visa-free destinations, a pretty respectable amount. Skimming further down the Henley Passport Index will reveal that Brunei (with 166 visa-free destinations) comes in at 22nd place.

So far, the gap between Southeast Asian passports seems to be quite big. Timor-Leste (or East Timor) ranks 60th on the Passport Index, with 94 visa-free destinations. Compared to Brunei, that’s a 38-place difference in ranking and 72 visa-free destinations apart.

This doesn’t exactly look good for the remaining Southeast Asian nations on the list now, does it? Sharing 70th place with Namibia is Thailand, with a passport that can travel to 79 visa-free destinations. Following closely in 76th place is Indonesia with 72 destinations. This spot on the list is also shared with Kenya, Tanzania, and Zambia.

Going another 10 places down the list, you’ll find the Philippines ranked at number 80, with only 67 visa-free destinations afforded to its travelers. But here’s where the numbers start to look a little more bleak for Southeast Asia. At number 92 on the Passport Index is Vietnam, with a passport that’s allowed entry in just 55 visa-free destinations.

One place down at 93 is Cambodia, with just 54 visa-free destinations. In second-last place among the Southeast Asian nations, Laos’ number 95 ranking can only afford its citizens entry into 51 visa-free destinations. The worst-performing passport in Southeast Asia goes to Myanmar at 99 on the list, also being the only nation in the region with access to less than 50 visa-free destinations (47).

We’ve already established the fact that the citizens of Japan, Singapore, and South Korea have the widest and easiest access to most of the world. But they each share a twisted irony: Their people don’t travel as much as you might think. Explaining the weird paradox behind this, Henley & Partners links it to sub-optimal international passenger demand in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.

In fact, when looking at IATA statistics, the regional demand has only grown to a mere 17 percent of pre-pandemic levels . And for the most of the past two years, this demand has just hovered below 10 percent. When comparing the figure to European and North American markets – where travel mobility has recovered to around 60 percent of pre-pandemic levels – APAC is far behind.

But Marie Owens Thomsen, Chief Economist at the IATA, says passenger numbers should reach 83 percent of pre-pandemic levels in 2022. “By next year, many markets should see traffic reach or exceed pre-pandemic levels, while we expect this to be the case for the industry as a whole in 2024,” she said. Click here to check out the 2022 Henley Passport Index.

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