Macroeconomics/Thailand’s economy

Chatrudee Theparat

Thailand’s economy is projected to grow by 4% this year.

The Thai economy this year is likely to grow by 4%, thanks to tourism recovery, private consumption, private investment and government expenditure as growth contributors.

Deputy Prime Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow said the Thai economy this year is projected to grow by 4%, the fastest rate after being hit hard by the pandemic in the past three years. The tourism sector, both international arrivals and domestic tourism, is expected to show a big improvement. The number of foreign arrivals is projected to reach 20 million, up from two million a year during the pandemic.

Deputy Prime Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow

Private consumption also is estimated to improve as well from 2022, although energy price still remains a threat to household consumption because the war between Russia and Ukraine has still continued. The government will keep monitoring more closely its government expenditure to achieve its target. Essentially this year, the government will keep the continuity of infrastructure development to help drive the economy and increase Thai competitiveness.

He said private investment also is a key to drive the economy such as applications to the Board of Investment reach 700 billion baht in 2022, up from 600 billion baht in 2021. The government has ambitious goal to drive the number of applications to meet one trillion baht in value in the near future.

Prime Minister Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha as the head of the government has laid down infrastructure to support new s-curve such as electrical vehicles (EV) with 30,000 sale volume last year, renewable energy, digital and bio circular green (BCG) economy. Those industries will be put ahead continuously to drive Thai economy this year.

He said the government implemented various measures to assist small and medium enterprises to survive in the past three years such as accessibility of SMEs to the government procurement, which reached 500 billion baht last year. The debt restructuring program of 12 million debtors with six trillion baht is quite in progress and only one-third of them left. The government expected such the program would be completed within two years.