SME Bank supports OTOP sale at Thai airports

BANGKOK, August 29 (TNA) - The Small and Medium Enterprise Development Bank of Thailand (SME Bank) supports the promotion and sale of local community products at Thai airports through soft loans provided to operators of the government-backed One Tambon One Product (OTOP) items. SME Bank on Tuesday signed an agreement on cooperation to promote OTOP items at Thai airports with allied parties, including the Department of Airports, under the Ministry of Transport, the Thai Industrial Standards Institute (TISI), under the Ministry of Industry, and Thai Smile Airways, an affiliate of Thai Airways International (THAI), the national flag carrier. SME Bank Director Mongkon Leelatham told journalists that the agreed cooperation is under a project on promoting Thai OTOP items and their SME operators in line with the government's Thailand 4.0 policy. Under the project, Mongkon said, local SME operators of OTOP items are allowed to showcase and sell their community-based products to earn more income at 28 Thai airports over the next couple of months initially. Mongkon revealed that his SME Bank is ready to provide soft loans to local SME operators of OTOP items, totally worth 7.5 billion baht, to a lending program on supporting domestic tourism-related businesses and operators of local community tourism businesses, which is authorized to then approve the soft loans to individual operators of OTOP items at the maximum of two million baht each. According to the SME Bank director, the individual operators of OTOP items can each receive a soft loan at the maximum of five million baht if they register their goods as value-added products taxed by the government. Besides, SME corporates of OTOP items can each receive a soft loan of up to 15 million baht, with the lending interest of the Minimum Loan Rate (MLR) minus 1.5 per cent in the first year and the MLR minus 1 per cent in the second year, the lending rates of which are the same for the individual operators of OTOP items. Meanwhile, Thai Smile Airways, a budget airline, is also ready to serve SME operators of OTOP items to fly to showcase and sell their goods at various Thai airports. (TNA)