Thai government's spending to boost national economy

BANGKOK, May 16 (TNA) - The National Economic and Social Development Board (NESDB) says that the Thai government should focus on state budget disbursements and investment in new mega-infrastructure development projects to boost the national economic growth in the rest of this year. NESDB Secretary-General Porametee Vimolsiri voiced the suggestion on Monday, stressing that state budgets to fund government projects should be disbursed as earlier planned. Porametee also suggested that the government prevent the fluctuation of foreign exchanges and control the strengthening Thai baht, while also assisting local agriculturists to be well-prepared for their upcoming crop growing season 2016-2017 and the local private sector to recover from a business slump. Porametee cautioned that risk factors of the Thai economy remain during the rest of 2016, including lower-than-expected global economic growth, declining prices of agricultural products on the world market, a volatility in foreign exchanges, an appreciation of the Thai baht, impacts from a possible increase in the key interest rate by the US Federal Reserve (FED) and a stricter measures in extending loans by financial institutes. Meanwhile, NESDB has maintained Thailand’s economic growth at 3.3 per cent year-on-year in 2016, after the national economy expanded by 3.2 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of this year, the highest in three years. The NESDB chief acknowledged that Thailand enjoyed a current account surplus of 585.6 billion baht, equivalent to 16.6 per cent of the country's gross domestic product (GDP), during the January-March period of this year. The NESDB chief projected, however, that Thai exports in 2016 should contract by 1.7 per cent, while inflation is expected at 0.1–0.6 per cent. (TNA)