Thai government to promote OTOPs on world market

BANGKOK, August 25 (TNA) - Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has urged more department stores to sell Thai community-based produce under the government-supported One Tambon One Product (OTOP) scheme and for Thai envoys stationed overseas to also help boost OTOP sales through various channels, namely the Internet, as her administration is promoting the Thai OTOPs on the world market. Speaking during her weekly broadcast programme, Yingluck asked local department stores to sell more goods under the OTOP programme to help open the door for the expanding OTOP sales overseas. In an attempt to generate more income for local villagers who produce OTOPs, Yingluck said that her government is considering to display OTOP goods on “tourism trains” which the government plans to launch later this year, running between Bangkok and Hua Hin resort district in Prachuap Khiri Khan province in the Upper Thai South and between Bangkok and Ayutthaya, the old Thai capital in the central region. After high-speed trains are launched in Thailand in future, the prime minister acknowledged, the government will also display and sell OTOPs and food to passengers. The prime minister also invited people to visit the OTOP Midyear 2012 fair, being held at Muang Thong Thani on the outskirts of Bangkok from August 20-26, noting that sales of OTOPs at the fair over the past five days amounted approximately 500 million baht and it is projected that total sale for the one-week fair should exceed 600 million baht. (TNA)