Thailand Travel News: Taking a bullish look at 2010, Thailand’s Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij is predicting the government’s economic packages will see the economy grow by at least 3.5 percent next year.

Dubbing 2010 “the year of execution of economic policies”, Mr Korn said trillions of baht will be injected into thousands of projects under the Thai Khem Khaeng (strong Thailand) program, to stimulate the economy.

In addition, the government plans to introduce land and assets taxes, establish a national savings fund, and continue with a pilot program already introduced to refinance money people have borrowed from loan sharks.

Mr Korn said Thailand’s gross domestic product (GDP) shrunk by 2.8 percent in 2009, after having enjoyed growth of 4.8 percent in the two previous years and 4.5 percent in 2006 – still well below the 6.7 percent growth in 2004 during the prime ministership of Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted in a military coup in 2006 – but better than the 4 percent drop predicted.

Mr Korn said the Thailand economy will continue to grow provided the domestic political situation did not become any worse than it did during 2009. He warned that political instability could return though, as the pro-democracy United Front for Democracy (UDD) or “red shirts”, have set up training schools throughout the Northeast and suburban Bangkok.

“Political demonstrations are normal, but the government must be able to function”, Mr Korn said.

Predicting an election to be at least a year away, Mr Korn said the government can turn the economy around over the next 12 months and go into an election with solid economic achievements behind it.

“A year ago, everyone agreed that the global economic crisis was very critical and it was feared the unemployment problem would be the worst [in Thai history], but after a year the unemployment rate has returned to normal and the economy is back on track”, he said.

By John Le Fevre

Thailand Travel News for December 29, 2009