BoT suggests Thailand needs to resolve 4 problems

BANGKOK, Jan 28 (TNA) -- Thailand still faces four major structural problems which need to urgently resolve speedily, said Veerathai Santiprabhob, governor of Bank of Thailand. Mr Veerathai said the four problems are household debt in which Thais aged lower than 20 already have debts at the average of 136,000 baht per person while bad debts accounted 16.4 per cent followed by poor competitiveness on exports which could become worsen if the US imposes trade barriers. On the US decision to withdraw from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), he said negative impact is not seen immediately because the agreement has not been implemented and could be good opportunity for Thailand to accelerate agreements at the regional level, Mr Veerathai said. According to him, the third major structural problem is weak private investment in which investment was seen in certain industries in the past few years. The potential of small and medium-sized enterprise has to be improved and it runs contradict to non-performing loans incurred sharply by the enterprise, he said. On Thailand’s economy this year, Mr Veerathai said it could sustain growth equivalent to 2016 at 3.2 per cent due to high expectations that exports would turnaround compared to last year which contracted 0.6 per cent. However, Thailand still faces external risks which include new US government’s policy, general elections in several European Union member countries, the Brexit, changes in China’s economic structural policy and an impact from US trade barriers upon China, he said. Domestic factors which need close monitoring are achievements on the Thai government’s policy to stimulate private investment, impact from suppression on illegal tour agencies and on a new general election which could be held either late this year or in 2018, he suggested. Thai financial market is expected to remain volatile throughout 2017, said Mr Veerathai, adding that inflation is projected to rise 1.5 per cent throughout this year. (TNA)