In 1995 Thailand's economy was signed out by the World Bank as the most consistently expansive and healthy economy world-wide in the preceding decade from 1985=1994. The Thai economy's growth rate averaged over eight percent during this decade, and is expected to move into place as the world's eight largest economy by the year 2020. Not only does Thailand exemplify the Asian economy miracle, but it is also taking centerstage when compared with economies world-wide.

Thailand's economy is expanding at more than double the world rate, according to the international Monestry Fund. the IMF estimated the world economy grew by 3.8 percent in 1995 and will expand by 4.2 percent in 1996. The most dynamic economies are in Asia, led by Thailand, which now outspaces Asian competetors Malayasia, Singapore and South Korea with growth levels exceeding 8 percent annually in recent years- benefiting from adoption of market - friendly policies. According to the Thailand development Research Insitute economic growth in 1996 will be 8.6 percent.

The Kingdom's high performance decade has doubled per capita income and transformed the Kingdom both in terms of economics and social change. Exports, tourism, investment and domestic consumption have expanded rapidly. Coupled with a favourable climate, ample arable land and rich natural resources. Thailand is a good place for its people to live-and a good place to do business.

Thailand's stable social, political and financial landscape has benefited both foriegn importers of its products and investors. Economic regulation is minimal; innovation has brust onto the scene, with educational institutions increasingly developing graduates who bring new thinking, design and functions to products and services. No longer gatekeeper and control agent of private business, Governemnt facilities a growing privatisation of state enterprises, as well as movement toward ontracting on a turn-key basis business and industrial organisations which were previously state monopolies. Business leadres and civil servants co-operate to encourage the push for economic evolution. Thai companies have both active export markets and growing local markets.

Thailand long ago left the world of rice monoculture and primary products. Today the kingdom is known forits textile products, computers and related parts, rubber and plastic products, footwear, processed seafood and plastic products. Some of the world's leading producers of cement, cermic tiles, sanitary ware, bearings, printed circuit board assemblies and computer peripherals, hard-disk drivers and varied agro-industrial products, are in Thailand. The Kingdom is now the world's primary producer of the rubber, claims the region's largest fishing fleet, and is the world's largest exporter of canned tuna, canned pineapple and frozen prawns.

With a growing number of significant overseas acquisitions, Thai enterpreneurs are becoming more active, visible and successful on the world stage. Doing business in Thailand is a pleasure, because the Thai business community and public servants are sensitive to quality of life conerns for visitors for business and holiday. Never having been colonised, Thais relate easily to foreigners, welcoming tourists and business visitors.

Continuing growth based on proven performance.

Thailand will be world's eight largest economy within 25 years, according to Britain's, The Economist. By the year 2020, the World Bank predicts, Thailand will have a larger economy than Brazil, Britain, France, Italy and Taiwan. Thailand'a own National Economic and Social Development Board sees a doubling of the economy by the year 2000-and the Kingdom ranking first in Southest Asia, among the seven ASEAN states.

Showing a positive example to the private sector, Royal Thai Government revenues grew by 12.4 percent in 1995, providing surplus revenues over expensees for the seventh year in succession. Twenty-nine commercial banks, (15 Thai and 14 foreign) with more than 3,000 branches, boasted combined assets valued at US$160,000 million at the end on 1994. Ninety-one finance companies with 181 branches listed total combines assets of US$9,100 million. And the Stock Exchange of Thailand showed nearly 400 listed companies at the end of 1994, with the market capitalisation of US$132,000 million.

Thailand's Baht is one of the world's most stable currencies. The expanding economy indicates a continuing impact on world markets. International reserves reached US$37,000 million at the end of 1995-equal to seven months of imports. Lloyd's List Maritime Register recently assessed Thailand's rapidly expanding ports and cargo handling capacity. More than 250 shipping lines call at the Kingdom's four major ports- which handled over 2.3 million total TEUs (1.47 million at Bangkok Port 500,000 containers at Laem Chabang) in 1995. Six private ports on the Chao Pharya River, Sri Chang and Map Ta Phut have added capacity. In 1995 the Port Authority of Thailand contracted a concession with a private firm, Bangkok Modern Terminal Co. Ltd. (BMT) to operate Laem Chabang's first terminal. Privatisation is expected to increase port capacity by 50,000 TEUs on containerised cargo and 125,000 tons of conventional cargo within the first year. The Port's capacity for containerised cargoes will grow to added 100,000 TEUs by 1997 following the installation of gantry cranes. By the year 2000 laem Chabang port Traffoic is expected to rise sharply to 2,000,000 TEUs. According to the port Authority plan, a fifth terminal will be opened in 1998, increasing capacity by 300,000 TEUs. The Port of Bangkok (Klong Toey) is operating at more than double its designed capacity. Excess capacity will flow either to the four private wharves - which have not begun to approach their combined 470,000 TEUs capacity-or to Laem Chabang.

In 1995 Bangkok Port moved to reduce the number of stockpilled empty containers from 15,000 TEUs to 7,500 TEUs and other measures to reduce congestion and improve efficiencyinclude reducing loading and unloading time from 30 hours to 15. In 1996 Bangkok Port prohibited full container load (FCL) cargo-excepting agricultural goods and certain other cargoes. Three hundred thousand FCL containers are now are loaded annually. LCL cargo will eventually be prohibited. Meanwhile, loading companies are being reduced from more than 50 in 1995 to a targeted four companies in future.

Manufacturing accounts for triple the share of GDP as compared to agriculture-- while farming -related employment occupies twice as many workers as manufacturing. From 1992 to 1996 the population rose from 57.3 million to 60.5 million--while the labour force grew from 32.4 to 34.6 million. While agriculture accounts for an ever smaller proportion of family income, off-farm opportunities are expanding with the growth of agro-business in rural areas, continued migration to Bangkok and to points of export. Rising real estate prices are leading to widespread conversion from farmlands into commercial property.

High energy demands for a high-performance economy.

Consequently energy demands are growing at an average of more than 11.5 percent annually between 1990 and 1995. Thailand's electricity needs are generating hydroelectric projects in Labs, Cambodia, Myanmar and China's Yunnan province. Domestic reserves of 3,300,000 million cubic feet of natural gas and 60 million barrels of oil and condensate are ample backup for the Kingdom's expanding industrial base.

A broad national consensus supporting free market forces has provided a foundation for Thailand's rapid transformation into a Newly Industrialised Economy (NIE). By the late-1990s more than 80 percent of the Kingdom's exports will be microwave ovens and Italian-inspired high-fashion garments.

Planning, education fuel vibrant 21st centuary growth.

Government has consistently promoted industrial decentralization, setting into motion ploicies bringing employment opportunities throughput the country. The eastern Seaboard, a primary center of industrial growth on the east coast, expanded, while the other regions. Such policy adjustments helped stabilize the Thai economy in the early 1980s and laid the foundations for the unprecedented growth which began in 1986 and transportation infrastructure moving into the mid-to-late-1990s.

Due to the magnitude of Thailand's extensive infrastructure improvements, the kingdom is seeing substantial investment opportunity and co-operation between public and private sectors. The face of Bangkok and its environs are now being lifted higher by a network of high-speed elevated trains and six-lane expressways designed to meet the needs of Thailand's premier metropolis well into the 21st century. Major governmental infrastructure investment was planned to increase from 35.5 percent of its expenditure in 1995 to 38.7 percent in 1996.

21st centaury world port hub for Thailand

Thailand has become one of Asia's leading airline hubs. In 1995, Bangkok International Airport handled nearly 21 million passengers (19,056,477), up 10 percent from 1994's 19,056,477 passengers. A Second Bangkok International Airport (SBIA) has begun construction, although the current Bangkok International Airport will continue to be expanded.

Construction began in 1995 on SBIA's 32-square-kilometer site in the south-eastern suburbs of Bangkok. SBIA's first-phase development involves an initial investment of some US$3,500 million. When completed in 2000, SBIA's first-phase will have a capacity of 30 milion annual passenger movements (MAP), ranking it among the world's top four international airports. SBIAs Master Plan provides for a eventual capacity of 100 MAP, exceeding any of the world's existing airports. In fact with a capacity of 100 MAP, the new facility will be larger than the present combined capacity of London/Healthrow, paris/DG and Frankfurt.

The coming years will see a Global Airtran Gateway positioning Thailand's Eastern Seaboard a a global player in 21st Centuary international trade. Three Global Airtran Gateways are planned--one in Germany, one in the United States and the third in the Thailand. Designed to make use of the existing U-tapao international Airport which is already capable of handing the world's largest cargo jets, the Global Airtran Gateway will give Thailand's exporters a critical competitve edge.

This brief review of some of major investments underway to upgrade Thailand's infrastructure should reinforce the foreign buyer's confidence and assure the profitability of a long -term investment in relationships with Thailand's exporters.

Diversified, on the move--and abundant.

Thailand's economic success must be attributed to the dynamism of the private sector in co-operation with capable, dedicated and forward-looking government planners. Several structural components contribute significantly to the Kingdom's continuing high growth rates. Especially from 1990-1996 when leading industrial economies world-wide experienced periods of sharp and sustained reesion.

Despite depressed economic conditions in Thailand's major export markets, the Kingdom's dynamic export sector continued to boom. From an export value of US$29,000 million in 1991, exports continued to increase at 13-20 percent annually, surpassing the US$54,800 million mark in 1995.

Thailand has a large and expanding domestic market, is a natural gateway to the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) markets of INdonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam, not to 60.3 million, Thailand offers manufactures a significant domestic market providing a solid base for domestic consumer purchases and large-scale export operations. As the rapidly developing economies of the Greater Mekong Sub-Region open their economies, Thailand is strategically located to supply basic consumer goods to this market.

Thailand's broad-based and widely-diversified economy derives its resilience from a competitive mix of manufacturing, agro-industry and tourism.

With a labour pool of 34.5 million (1996), universal primary education and the second highest basic literacy rate in Asia (after Japan), Thailand is expanding compulsary education from six to nine years and will invest added resources for expanded educational and vocational training in scientific and technical fields. Thailand's wage levels are higher than in many less-developed Asian economies, but the Kingdom remains highly competitive due to superior productivity and the outstanding loyalty of the Thai worker.

Projected investment expenditure in infrastructure projects

Projected investment expenditure in infrastructure projects
(million US dollars)

Development Board

Thailand lowered its population growth rate to 1.2 percent by the end of the Seventh five-year Plan in 1996, down from 3.6 percent in the 1960s. Such a dramatic decrease means that the benefits from the nations growing wealth translate more directly into improved standards of living for the majority of the Thai people than would otherwise be the case with a higher population growth rate.

Thailand's economy is poised to continue its dynamic performance well into the first quarter of the 21st Centuary. Importers of products boasting the "Made in Thailand" label will benefit by joining forces with Thailand, the world's most healthy, expanding-- and globally competitive source, "Source Central"

Source: Department of Export Promotion.