The association expects investment of Bt70 billion during these two years, down from Bt100 billion yearly during some years in the past, TSCA president Wallaya Chirathivat said.
The investments were being made both on the opening of new shopping centres and facelifts to existing malls. The new developments have been mainly in Bangkok, other major cities, and border provinces to attract shoppers from Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam.
She said Thailand’s shopping malls currently occupied 18 million square metres of ground floor area (GFA), which was expected to increase to about 18.7 million square metres next year. TSCA members currently operate 91 shopping malls occupying 7.6 million square metres in GFA, about 42 per cent of the total.
Wallaya said the investments made by local mall developers would usually be in line with the internal rate of return, which had declined from 12-14 per cent about three or four years ago to between 7 and 12 per cent today.
“We [mall developers] invest for the long term. However, the world economy has not fully recovered. Thailand is also changing its policy to focus on promoting the tourism sector and supporting small and medium-sized enterprises, and such policies will attract more investments from the private sector, especially tourism-related businesses.”
She added that the shopping-centre industry generated 16 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product, making it the second-largest contributor after the industrial sector. Tourism is third, generating about 12 per cent of the country’s GDP.
Wallaya said average spending by individual foreign tourists was about Bt5,000 per day, and only Bt1,200 or 24 per cent was for shopping. Meanwhile, Thais spend about Bt170 billion abroad every year, of which Bt51 billion is for shopping.
“We [TSCA] are committed to our vision of driving the economy and supporting Thailand becoming No 1 in Asean and the ultimate destination for shopping in the region, comparable to world-class tourist destinations like Hong Kong and Singapore,” she said.
“We are setting a three-year [2016-18] business development plan for TSCA members in line with the government’s policies, focusing on tourism, which has a major role in [generating] the country’s revenue.”
She said the number of inbound travellers and tourism revenue had increased every year.
According to the Department of Tourism, the number of foreign tourists to Thailand was almost 30 million last year, up 20.4 per cent over 2014. Tourism revenue was about Bt2.33 trillion last year.
“After the full opening of the Asean Economic Community, a large number of tourists and investors from around the world will enter the region, resulting in intense competition among Asean member countries. Therefore, we need to accelerate the development of our distinguished shopping centres to strengthen Thailand’s [ability] to compete in both the regional and global trade arenas,” Wallaya said.