Thailand to set up economic rehab center as post Covid-19 economic measure

Thai government officials on Friday 10 July 2020 disclosed that Thailand is planning to set up centers for economy revitalization in the country to aid small businesses cope well with the pandemic-hit economy.

Deputy Secretary-General of the Prime Minister’s Office, Kobsak Pootrakool, said that the center would be primarily concerned with economic issues engendered by the Covis-19 pandemic.

“From now on, it must be a balance between disease issues and the mouth and stomach of the people,” Pootrakool said.

He further stated that on a projection that the coronavirus pandemic could still be around longer than necessary, the government is willing to extend the debt moratoria for small-and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) from October.

Thailand has recorded fewer cases of coronavirus infections with no new domestic transmission in more than one month, but the country’s economy has been severely hit by the global impact of the pandemic.

The state planning agency in charge of supervision of the government’s 1 trillion baht borrowing for economic recovery would look into assisting SMEs with about 50 billion baht ($1.6 billion).

Finance Minister, Uttama Savanayana, said in a statement that liquidity seems to be the major concern with SMEs given that it has direct impacts on jobs.

As a result Uttama has requested that more credit guarantees be made available so that about 45 billion baht could be borrowed by more than 40,000 small firms from banks.

While raising this concern, the Minister said, “The most urgent issue for SMEs is liquidity because it directly affects jobs.”