The number of the certified companies has risen to 152.

The CAC also witnessed an increase in its member companies to 548, from 525 in October 2015.

“Despite tougher criteria last year, the number of certified companies increased by 19 compared to 11 in the previous quarter. This demonstrates the private sector’s enthusiasm in putting in place anti-corruption practices,” said Bandid Nijathaworn, secretary-general of the CAC.

In July 2015, eight independent experts were invited to join the Certification Committee. All companies vying for the certification are also required to comply with all the guidelines within 18 months. They are also required to re-apply for the cerfication after three years.

Sanan Angubolkul, chairman of Srithai Superware Group and head of the government’s private-sector team tasked with boosting exports and overseas investment projects, told The Nation in an interview that the public and private sectors would work together to increase the country’s export shipments by 5 per cent this year.

In addition, the team will help gear up outbound investment projects by Thai investors in Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam, as well as in Malaysia, to boost the economy’s competitiveness in the Asean Economic Community (AEC).

Regarding exports, he said, with Thai shipments flat last year, the government’s economic team led by Deputy Prime Minister Somkid Jatusripitak wanted to revive the export sector, so a working group was set up to focus on this issue since exports are crucial to economic growth, accounting for as much as 70 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product.

The working group’s public-sector team on exports and outbound investments is headed up by Commerce Minister Apiradee Tantraporn and consists of the chiefs of the Board of Investment (BoI), the Foreign Trade Department and the International Trade Promotion Department.

As for the working group’s private-sector team, there are 17 members, including Asawin Techacharernwikul of Berli Jucker, Prasit Boon-duangprasert of CP Food, Wasit Tae-paisitpong of Betagro Group, Chanin Wongkusolkij of Ban Pu, Prin Chirathiwat of Central Group, Attapol Reukpibul of PTT, and Kobsak Phutrakul of Bangkok Bank.

Sanan said the working group holds both weekly and monthly meetings to follow up on its tasks as part of the government’s policy to revive the economy with a growth target of 3-3.5 per cent for 2016.

“The economy has long been driven by the private sector’s activities. We are practical and know the challenges. Now, the government wants us to help in a more systematic manner, while economic and other ministries will facilitate our efforts.

“Regarding exports, the target is to grow shipments by at least 2.2 per cent this year and, if we worked hard enough, we could probably achieve an additional growth rate of 2.8 per cent, or a total 5-per-cent export expansion,” he explained.

“On outbound investments, we need to change the mindset of the BoI, which has been more familiar with inbound investment promotion for the past several decades. Now, the target is to push Thai firms to invest in neighbouring countries within the AEC.

“Srithai Group and other big Thai companies have been investing in foreign countries, especially in China, Vietnam Laos and Cambodia, for the past 20 years. We have a lot of experience to share with the public sector and smaller Thai firms,” he added.

“So far, the government still lacks a good database on Thai firms’ outbound investment activities. Besides CLMV countries [Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam], Thai firms should also explore opportunities in Iran, Russia and India. Iran is opening up again following the end of sanctions and has good potential for petrochemical investments, while India is good for consumer products and food items,” Sirithai’s chairman said.

Coaching by conglomerates

“On China, many analysts talk about an economic slowdown, but I think the Thai government should pursue government-to-government business deals, especially for agricultural products. For CLMV, exporters should focus on more sales of automotive and electronic products, as well as on commodities such as sugar, rice and farmed woods,” he suggested.

The working group’s private-sector team has also proposed a system of large companies helping smaller ones, with the CEOs of all 15 participating conglomerates agreeing to coach a total of 45 firms at a 1:3 ratio, in order to share resources and expertise in implementing overseas investment projects.

For example, Berli Jucker, which recently purchased Vietnam’s retail giant Metro, is ready to help smaller firms do business and invest in Vietnam, while Central Group, Srithai Group and other major Thai investors in Vietnam would also participate in the coaching programme, Sanan said.

CLMV countries plus Malaysia and Thailand have a combined population of more than 230 million, which could be viewed as a combined single market for Thai companies, he said, adding that the government should also set aside a budget to hire lobbyists in these countries to create a network of connections that would facilitate trade and investment flows.

After that, Thailand also needs to set up an agency similar to the Japan External Trade Organisation to deal with trading-partner countries in the AEC, he said.

Leading the pack is China Investment Corporation (CIC), the sovereign wealth fund, which expressed strong interest in investing in Thailand Infrastructure Fund, established to raise capital from both individual investors and institutional investors in order to finance infrastructure projects across the country.

The minister, who led a mission to Beijing during January 29-30, said the fund matches CIC’s goal in seeking stable and long-term returns.

To facilitate the investment, the State Enterprise Policy Office will deal directly with CIC, he added.

During a discussion with state-enterprises and private companies, Apisak unveiled Thailand’s Special Investment Promotion Year 2016, whereby incentives would be offered to draw more foreign investment particularly to 10 key industries.

The enterprises were interested in exploring investment opportunities in Thailand as well as setting up headquarters here, the minister said.

He added that more investment from large-sized Chinese enterprises would give a long-term boost to the Thai economy and the manufacturing sector, as well as assist Thailand’s goal to become the trade and investment hub in Asean.

Sirinart Chaimun, director-general at the Trade Negotiations Department, said that RCEP member states, which includes 10 Asean countries, China, Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, and New Zealand, will call for a meeting of the 11th RCEP Trade Negotiation Committee next month to speed up discussions on many issues.

The meeting is set for Brunei from February 15-19.

The discussion will focus on ensuring an RCEP agreement by the end of this year. Issues that would be included are support for tariff reduction among the 16 members.

During the first stage, RCEP will reduce tariff for 65 per cent of trade in goods – about 8,000-9,000 goods items – to zero immediately, while tariff for 20 per cent of trade in goods will be reduced to zero within 10 years after the RCEP implementation. Tariff on the remaining 15 per cent of trade in goods will be negotiated in the future, as they are considered as sensitive products for each country.

“RCEP will also discuss whether they could cut tariff for 100 per cent of trade in goods or reduce sensitive lists as much as possible than at present,” she said.

Sirinart added that Thailand might be agreeable for zero tariff on 80 per cent of trade in goods, much larger than in the previous agreement.

To liberalise trade in services, RCEP countries have primarily agreed to open service businesses similar to the Asean Free Trade Agreement, while they could propose to liberalise more. In investments, each country will propose the sectors they will liberalise during the meeting.

Besides economic cooperation, RCEP countries will also discuss intellectual property rights, competition, and electronic commerce.

Sirinart said that RCEP should liberalise more than under the Asean agreement, because if it was less than under other FTAs, RCEP would face difficulty in competing with the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Sirinart said it was important for RCEP to liberalise trade, services and investment as much as possible to make it the world’s largest free-trade bloc.

If the 16-member RCEP is accomplished, it will be the world’s largest free-trade agreement, with a population of 3.35 billion, or more than 50 per cent of the world’s total.

The combined gross domestic product would be worth more than US$17.1 trillion (Bt538 trillion), or 27 per cent of global GDP.

As of 2014, Thailand’s total trading value with RCEP countries was worth US$2.6 trillion, accounting for 57 per cent of the Kingdom’s total trading value.

Thai exports to RCEP were valued at $1.27 trillion, or 56 per cent of total export value, while imports were worth $1.33 trillion, accounting for 58 per cent of total imports.

The ministry recently assigned both CAT Telecom and TOT to achieve this goal this year on a Bt15-billion budget.

An ICT Ministry source said that CAT and TOT have already reached a preliminary agreement on the zones where they will install the broadband networks.

CAT will roll out the broadband network in the North and the Northeast, totalling 15,000 villages, at a cost of Bt7.5 billion. TOT will oversee the central part of Thailand and the South, covering the |same number of villages at the same cost.

Both TOT and CAT also will have to finish installing the broadband networks in 7,500 villages inaccessible to the networks within six months.

TOT owns 60MHz bandwidth of the 2.3GHz, which can be used until 2025.

Montchai said the state agency is targeting revenue of Bt65 billion this year, with earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation of Bt4.3 billion.

TOT will trim operating cost by 5 per cent. It will cut staffing by 1,300 from its existing 15,000 employees.

It will also launch an infrastructure fund for an underground viaduct, which companies can lease to lay their cable networks.

It will also launch an additional two million access points of fibre optic network with an initial budget of Bt35 billion to provide commercial broadband service.

Montchai is hopeful that the broadband project of the ICT Ministry and its own fibre network will enable TOT to expand its broadband service market share to 30 per cent in the next few years from 29 per cent at the present. It is now in third place behind True Corp and Triple T Broadband.

TOT’s board has already selected Advanced Info Service as its partner to provide 3G wireless broadband service on its 2.1GHz spectrum band. AIS will lease 80 per cent of the spectrum capacity to provide the service. However, both have yet to sign on the deal.

Currently TOT and its existing 3G partners have a combined 500,000 3G subscribers.

Thai Agriculturalists Association president Suthep Kongmark said small farmers needed soft loans to invest in rice production.

The government launched the plantation-integration project to encourage small farmers to integrate their rice fields to lower their production costs.Each farmer will need about Bt100,000 in loans to increase their financial liquidity, Suthep said.

Chutima Bunyapraphasara, permanent secretary of the Commerce Ministry, said the government would need to discuss the rice farmers’ proposal and decide whether to approve a budget for helping them.

Cutting costs

She said the government would continue to help lower costs of production by calling for fertiliser, pesticide, and seed traders to reduce their price for farmers.

The Interior Ministry will also help by urging landowners to reduce rental fees for farmers.

The Commerce Ministry’s working committee to formulate a national rice strategy foresees that rice production this year could be 8 per cent higher than the previous expectation of about 25 million tonnes of paddy, increasing to 27 million tonnes.

Of that 27 million tonnes, about 115 million tonnes would be paddy white rice, 7 million tonnes jasmine rice, 7.1 million tonnes sticky rice, 1 million tonnes Pathum Thani rice, and the remaining 100,000 tonnes other grains such as organic and speciality rice.

Meanwhile, the Internal Trade Department will soon hold talks with tyre manufacturers in an effort to persuade them to reduce their prices following the lower cost of rubber.

Wiboonlasana Ruamraksa, director-general of the department, said the price of rubber tyres could be reduced by another 35 per cent after the price was already decreased by 15 per cent last year.

Moreover, retail prices of 11 products will soon decrease by 1.6-25 per cent on lower oil prices.

Nopparat Maythaveekulchai, TCEB president, said 100 Thai MICE entrepreneurs with total event space of 227 rooms were guaranteed with the Thailand Meeting Venue Standard (TMVS) in the 2016 fiscal year.

In the 2015 fiscal year the number was 42 and comprised 114 meeting rooms. The bureau is moving to implement the second phase of the standardisation of MICE venue standards in accordance with a five-year model by expanding the implementation into a regional scale.

The planned advancement of MICE capabilities in 2016 covers four aspects – trade education, a MICE academy, meeting international standards and sustainable natural conservation.

The TMVS is the official model for the development of the Asean MICE standard.

The 43rd Asean Senior Officials Meeting on tourism, held this month in Manila, agreed to include the MICE venue standard formulated by Thailand in the Asean Tourism Strategic Plan 2016-2025. This means that Thailand is steering Asean’s MICE standards.

Thailand was appointed the host committee of the subcommittee for the development of MICE standards. It is working with the nine other Aseanmember countries.

The regional venue standard manual is expected to be active in 2017.

In the 2016 fiscal year, it is forecast that Thailand’s MICE revenue will increase by 5 per cent, equal to a million travellers. MICE revenue next year is forecast at Bt92 billion.

The TCEB has produced the model for the Thai MICE venue standard for 2015-2019. It comprises six key strategies that cover six dimensions of development. They are venue; personnel; information technology; public relations and marketing promotion; the promotion of the Asean MICE venue standard; and using the standard to create sustainability for 41 projects under a Bt66-million budget.

In 2016, the operation will be divided into two parts. First, the MICE Venue Standard Development Project will be conducted across five cities – Pattaya, Bangkok, Chiang Mai, Phuket and Khon Kaen – with the collaboration of the Management System Certification Institute.

Second, the TCEB plans to expand it operations to develop an exhibition venue standard, as Thailand has been well recognised by the Global Association of Exhibition Industry as the region’s top exhibition-staging country.

After leading the Thai negotiation team for the second round of negotiation on a free-trade agreement (FTA) in Islamabad this week, Sunanta Kangvalkulkij, deputy director-general of the Commerce Ministry’s Trade Negotiations Department, said the two sides had made a lot of progress on a tax-reduction format and other issues.

“To accelerate the wrapping up of many issues in the FTA, the two countries have also agreed to hold further discussions via videoconference before the next round of negotiations so that progress can be made on some technical topics,” she said.

The third round of the FTA talks is set for May, and Thailand will host the negotiations.

Sunanta said that with so much progress on many issues, the FTA could be finalised by the end of this year, earlier than the previous target, which had been set for 2017.

Both Thailand and Pakistan would like to accelerate the FTA since each country considers the other as a gateway to a wider region. Thailand can be a springboard for Pakistan to Aseancountries, while Pakistan will be a springboard for Thailand to South Asia.

Pakistan is considered a good source of raw materials for many industries in the Kingdom. Thailand could also be a destination for strategic investment as Pakistan seeks trading opportunities in other Asean countries.

In 2014, Thailand enjoyed a trade surplus of US$734 million (Bt26.2 billion) with Pakistan, and similar trade surpluses have been registered by the Kingdom since 2010.

Bilateral trade reached $1.01 billion in 2014, with Thailand’s exports to Pakistan worth $874 million.

Pakistan is Thailand’s second-largest trading partner in South Asia after India, and No 46 globally.