Economic, energy policies to be submitted to NCPO

BANGKOK, May 27 (TNA) - The Thai Ministries of Finance and Energy are about to propose their economic stimulus policies to the National Council for Peace and Order(NCPO). Permanent Secretary for Finance Rungson Sriworasat told journalists on Tuesday that his ministry's investment budget disbursements for the 2014 fiscal year, which started from October 1, 2013, have been 9 per cent behind schedule and the Budget Bureau will order concerned authorities next week to speed up investment in 20 important projects, worth over one billion baht each, to stimulate the national economy in the second half of this year. Rungson said if government budgets were disbursed at their normal rate, the Thai economy next year would grow faster than this year. The permanent secretary for finance admitted that the loss of the official rice-pledging scheme this year would be higher than figures over the past years, but it should not reach 500 billion baht, noting that figures about the rice-pledging scheme would be concluded in the near future. Permanent Secretary for Energy Suthep Liumsirijarern acknowledged, meanwhile, that his ministry would propose 30 plans to NCPO Deputy Chief Air Chief Marshal Prajin Jantong, who supervises economic affairs, with urgent ones including the necessity for energy businesses to operate around the clock, campaigns to save domestic energy consumption to cope with a gas supply suspension from the Malaysia-Thailand Joint Development Area (JDA), where gas production will be closed for maintenance from June 13-July 10, 2014 and the approval of a new power development plan, as well as the 21st round of petroleum concessions and the restructuring of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) prices. (TNA)