Potential of Thai business operators keeps rising

BANGKOK, September 21 (TNA) - A latest survey, jointly conducted by the Department of Industrial Promotion, under the Thai Ministry of Industry, and the Federation of Thai Industries (FTI), has found that potential of business operators in the country has been strengthening, thanks to their awareness on a need for their further development towards the Thailand 4.0 era. Panuwat Triyangkulsri, Deputy Director-General of the Department of Industrial Promotion told journalists of the update on September 20, indicating that the latest survey in August 2018 by the joint public-private sectors found 30 factories in Thailand got the 4.0 grade, which showed their high potential to "go inter" or to move forward to cope with international opportunities and challenges, compared to no 4.0-graded business operators in the country in the previous survey during 2016-2017. Panuwat acknowledged most of the 30 factories gaining the 4.0 mark are in the domestic digital, automobile and construction sectors and although they accounted for only 2 per cent of the overall 1,500 factories surveyed, it showed a significant potential improvement of Thai business operators over the past couple of years. Panuwat revealed that the latest survey also found Thailand's business operators gaining the 3.0 grade increased by almost double from only 22 factories in the previous survey to 420 factories in this year's survey, or increased from 15 per cent of those total surveyed to 28 per cent, whereas the country's business operators gaining the moderate 2.0 grade and the basic 1.0 grade dropped to 61 per cent and 9 per cent in this year's survey, from 74 per cent and 11 per cent respectively in the previous survey. According to the senior official, the self-assessment tool was used in the latest survey to measure the potential of Thai business operators in six dimensions, including smart operation, strategy & orgnaization, workforce, technology & innovation, market customer & standard and information technology (IT) & data transaction. The senior official said his department and FTI have set a joint target to work together to upgrade up to about 500,000 business operators in Thailand to the 3.0-4.0 grades over the next 10 years and to the higher 5.0 grade thereafter, with over 60 factories anticipated to gain the 4.0 grade in 2019 alone. Meanwhile, FTI expressed its readiness to move forward its industry transformation policy to further develop the potential and competitiveness of Thai business operators, pointing out that the latest survey has shown what the Thai industrial sector needs to improve their potential the most are in their marketing strategies and their tactics on the understanding of customers, rather than the lack of their awareness on the application of advanced technologies to their production processes. (TNA)