Mobile Cabinet meeting to mull economic and social development projects in Thai South

BANGKOK, November 17 (TNA) - Economic and social development projects in 11 southern Thai provinces will be included on the agenda of the next mobile Cabinet meeting in the Thai Far South late this month. Dondej Pattanarat, Governor of Songkhla Province, chaired a meeting of relevant parties in his province on November 16 to discuss the economic and social development projects in the 11 southern Thai provinces, as ordered by the Ministry of Interior. The 11 southern Thai provinces include Chumphon, Surat Thani, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Phattalung, Phuket, Ranong, Phang-nga, Krabi, Trang, Satun and Songkhla. According to the Interior Ministry's order, issues relevant to the economic and social development projects in the 11 southern Thai provinces, raised at Thursday's meeting, be proposed to the ministry in Bangkok by November 17 to be submitted to the mobile Cabinet meeting in Songkhla on November 28. Issues raised at Thursday's meeting were concluded in three main strategic areas, including the development of local tourist sites in the southern Thai provinces to be among the world's leading quality tourist attractions, the promotion and development of the southern Thai region to become a new processed farm produce industrial zone in the country and the improvement and development of local basic infrastructure to support tourism and industrial zones in the region to be connected with the global trade. The Songkhla governor, meanwhile, declared his province's readiness to host the upcoming official mobile Cabinet meeting, covering security arrangements and the prepared agenda for the meeting. Thai Prime Minister General Prayut Chan-ocha and his Cabinet members are scheduled to arrive in Pattani Province on November 27 to first hold a meeting with relevant parties to follow up the government's development programs for the violence-plagued Thai Deep South, including those being implemented under a triangle project on security, prosperity and sustainability, and to look into public security measures. The prime minister and his Cabinet members will then travel to Songkhla to hold a meeting in the evening with governors of southern Thai border provinces and representatives of the local private sector. On November 28, the mobile Cabinet meeting will be officially held at Rajamangala University of Technology Srivijaya in Songkhla, after which the Thai premier will lead his Cabinet members to meet local people before returning to Bangkok. (TNA)