Thai government to boost tourism, livelihood of southerners

BANGKOK, October 27 (TNA) - Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra says that her government will find ways to boost tourism and agriculture, as well as the development of fresh water and transportation routes in four southern provinces along the Gulf of Thailand. Yingluck told the public during her weekly address on Saturday morning that the Thai Cabinet agreed at its mobile meeting on Samui Island in Thailand's southern Surat Thani on October 20-21 to further develop Surat Thani, as well as adjancent Chumphon, Nakhon Si Thammarat and Phatthalung Provinces to particularly boost tourism and to improve the livelihood of people living in the four coastal provinces along the Gulf of Thailand. Yingluck acknowledged that the Thai Ministry of Transport has been assigned to conduct a feasibility study on an official plan to link transportation routes between the Andaman coast and the Gulf of Thailand in the southern region, aimed at attracting international tourists visiting the areas to stay longer, as well as at improving road facilities to enable visitors to reach new tourism destinations in the region.(TNA)