Flood prevention progresses well at Thai industrial sites

BANGKOK, August 1 (TNA) - The Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand (IEAT) has confirmed that industrial sites under its supervision and those run by the private sector are now ready to cope with, probably, any flooding later this year. IEAT Governor Veerapong Chaiperm told journalists Wednesday that the construction of permanent flood prevention dykes at several industrial estates in Bangkok's adjacent Ayutthaya and Pathum Thani provinces have already been 80 per cent complete, and that they will be 90 per cent built over the next 30 days; so, the Thai industrial estates are now ready to cope with possible floods. Veerapong acknowledged that the construction of permanent dykes at six industrial estates under the IEAT will, meanwhile, start over the next six months and will be complete by early next year. Veerapong said that he will also ask the IEAT board in mid-August to spend some 180 million baht on contingent flood prevention systems, in the meantime, to protect the six IEAT-run industrial estates, which can, however, be used for as long as five years. According to the IEAT chief, foreign business operators are increasing their investment at several Thai industrial estates, partly resulting from the relocation of their manufacturing plants from Ayutthaya and Pathum Thani to the eastern seaboard and Sa Kaeo province in the Thai East, insisting that Japanese and European investors appear, particularly, to be satisfied with and believed in the Thai government's flood prevention plans. (TNA)