Dr Toney K Thomas

Dr. Toney K. Thomas is the head of the School of Tourism Studies at Mahatma Gandhi University. He is also a visiting Professor of Institute of Tourism Studies at Far Eastern University in the Philippines, an adjunct faculty at Amity University in India, and a visiting professor of Faculty of Commerce and Business Administration (Tourism) at Mangalore University in India. His research interests include Asian Tourism Studies, Tourist Behavior, and Destination Benchmarking. He has accomplished several research and consultancy projects for notable bodies such as the World Bank, the European Union, and the Ministry of Science and Technology Malaysia. He has consulted on academic projects including programme designs, Outcome Based Education (OBE design), internationalisation of universities, and global ranking. Toney is the recipient of Presidents Award for Excellence in Teaching and Learning for his project based teaching and learning method that extended impact to the community which is acknowledged by Pacific Asian Travel Association (PATA), United Nation’s World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) and United Nation’s Economic Commission for Africa. He is also the recipient of the chairman’s award for excellence in scholarly activities from Taylor University for securing international projects. Toney was part of PATA’s consulting team for the Nepal Tourism Rapid Recovery Force in 2015. He is also the recipient of the International Award from the Pacific Asia Travel Association’s PATA Face of the Future. He is also an ERUDITE scholar by the Kerala State Higher Education council in 2015. Toney is the founding chair of Asian Tourism Research and the founding editor-in-chief of the Asian Tourism Research Journal.