Thailand urged to prepare for AC

BANKGOK, July 5 (TNA) - Thailand has been urged to develop its products and human resources, especially people’s English language skills, to prepare for the formation of the ASEAN Community (AC) by 2015. In his speech on Thailand’s preparation for the AC at a session organized by the Center for ASEAN Studies of Thammasat University in Bangkok on Friday morning, Former ASEAN Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan said although the process of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) toward the AC started long ago, the 10-member grouping still needs to lead to the real unity of their nations so that they will have more bargaining power and reduce conflicts within the region. Surin acknowledged that the AC will be greater than other communities in the world for its combined population and area among other factors, and that ASEAN is not the matter of people of the older generations, but the matter of people of the present and the younger generations who are to be prepared for operating overseas. The former ASEAN chief suggested, as all other member countries have actively prepared for their participation in the AC, Thailand also needs to hurriedly adjust itself in all areas because ASEAN will be the gateway for imports and exports and Thailand cannot limit only at imports. Besides, the former ASEAN chief noted, Thailand is to reduce income inequality and its dependence on other countries to reduce costs and to invest more in education, while developing research and innovations to increase national science and technological produce for national maximization. (TNA)