Why Thailand Is Crazy Over Asean Economic Community

[webfact]

REGIONAL PERSPECTIVE

Why Thailand is crazy over AEC

Kavi Chongkittavorn

BANGKOK: -- These days in Thailand, not a single day passes by without AEC (Asean Economic Community) on the headlines. The billion-baht worth of AEC campaign is zeroed in on with one single issue: to prepare the country and Thai people to compete with other nine members in the Asean Economic Community by 2015. Under the government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, the AEC platform has been accorded a top priority and morphed into a major populist policy. Any reference that has the word "AEC" in it would certainly get the government funding. That explains why there are hundreds of AEC seminars in the past several months.

At the Asean foreign ministerial meeting over the weekend in Phnom Penh, the Asean leaders still struggled with the date when the Asean Community (AC) would start. Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, the Cambodian chair, told the meeting that the AC should begin on 1st of January 2015 not on 31st December as agreed by the Asean economic ministers in their earlier meeting. The key reason was quite simple - a delay of 364 days would allow most of the Asean members additional time and room to implement remaining measures and prepare for the AC arrival with better preparedness. The majority of Asean members seemed to prefer the last day of 2015 as they thought the AC is a process that would continue beyond 2015. Rightly so, during the summit on Sunday, Prime Minister Hun Sen decided to go for 31st December as the date.

Within Asean, Thailand has been the only Asean member with a comprehensive plan to prepare for the 2015 deadline. At the end of October, the government has adopted the eight-point strategic plan prepared by the National Economic and Social Development Council. The plan outlines the strength and weakness of Thailand's overall capacity to engage the one Asean community. The Thai concerned officials drafted the strategic plan mainly from documental sources such as the Asean Charter, hundreds of agreements and blueprints, the Master Plan of Asean Connectivity as well as data and information collected from all government agencies related to all the three pillars - economic, political/security and social/culture. Judging from the plan, the Yingluck government will be spending a lot more money in months to come.

The strategies focus on eight priorities: the ability to compete in trade in goods and services as well as investment, the development of quality of life and social safety net, the infrastructural and logistic development, the human resource development, regulatory reform, promotion of awareness of Asean, strengthening the country's national security and the capacity building for key Thai cities to link up with the rest of Asean.

Deep down, these strategies reveal extremely high anxieties as well as the lack of confidence of the country's ability when Asean becomes a single production base. They fear of the unknown consequences. Doubtless, the narrative of the day is how to compete with other Asean countries instead of collective spirit to promote the grouping's bargain power. General speaking, Thailand as the Asean's second largest economy would benefit from the AEC because of its location in the mainland Southeast Asia and dynamic private sector. Indeed, Asean is the number one market for absorbing around 23 per cent of Thailand's total exports. Somehow, there is a lingering fear that the government, the SMEs sector and the Thai people are not ready for the borderless Asean.

As far as the government agencies are concerned, Ministry of Commerce, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Foreign Affairs are the three key driving forces. Kudos must go to the first because in the past two years for implanting the AEC slogan in the Thai psyche due to the non-stop bombardments from commerce officials and advertisements.

The Ministry of Commerce has the largest chunk of overall budget. It also knows very well all the serious problems the country is confronting in implementing various AEC measures, especially on liberalizing the services sector. It is not surprising that there are a lot of spins about the country's state of preparedness and readiness.

It must be noted that the Ministry of Education has turned the AEC campaign into "Let learn English" campaign, which is the major component of its long-term strategy. It has an elaborated plan to quickly provide English education to the Thai people both in urban and rural areas and equipped vocational students with skills and language ability that can communicate with other Asean countries.

Throughout Thailand, the AEC has now become the main justification to study more English. There is a surge of English language schools in provincial towns. Some regional universities in KhonKaen and UbonRatchathani teach languages in Asean countries including Bahasa Indonesia, Burmese, Vietnamese.

Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds. Now, all the Thai citizens are encouraged to learn and speak English to prepare the Asean community while the education plan continues with the status quo. Currently, at any given day, hundreds of officials from district, provincial and national levels are taking part in English language training and the so-called Asean awareness campaign.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is working hard to maintain the country's Asean profile which is not easy under the leadership and working style of Yingluck government. Within the country, the ministry has to constantly inform and remind the public that the AEC is only one of the three AC pillars. The other two - political/security and social/culture - are equally important. All three must progress in tandem to transform the borderless Asean.

Sad but true, on the social and cultural pillar, Ministry of Culture so far has not been unable to catch up or get the necessary budget for its own projects.

There is an urgent need to educate the Thai people about their immediate neighbors about the challenges posed by the AC. One of the ministry's long standing flagship projects to establish a museum that tells the history of Asean and its key players could not obtain necessary funding. Asean was found in LaemThaen, Bang Saen, Chon Buri in August 1967.

After the Asean Charter was adopted, Thailand has been at the forefront to promote the people-oriented Asean community ensuring that the voices of at the grassroots are heard. Dr Surin Pitsuwan, Secretary General of Asean, whose term is ending in six weeks, has also helped to channel the inputs of civil society organizations. Thailand has become the most open-minded, along with Indonesia, when it comes to human rights and democracy. At the summit last week, the Philippines returned to its root of liberalism by stating that unless there were changes in the draft Asean Declaration of Asean Human Rights, Manila would opt out completely, prompting Indonesia to come to a rescue with a proposal to include the preamble of UN Universal Human Rights Declaration in the working document, which will be read by the Asean chair.

When 2015 arrives, the Thai hyperbole over the AEC will certainly fade away. For one thing, there will be no budget to spoil any more. After all the efforts, real or imagine, are focused on the preparedness for 2015. None has yet to stress what Thailand would be liked in the post 2015.

-- The Nation 2012-11-19

[asiawatcher]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

[Payboy]

None has yet to stress what Thailand would be liked in the post 2015.

The Nation will surely be same-same-but-different.

[dcutman]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

I believe the Yingluck govt cut the Uni research budget in half. Just enough to keep the "human tape recorders" status quot.

[jaltsc]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

"I love my government... I love my government...I love my government..." "Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world..."

[Pib]

At the Asean foreign ministerial meeting over the weekend in Phnom Penh, the Asean leaders still struggled with the date when the Asean Community (AC) would start. Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, the Cambodian chair, told the meeting that the AC should begin on 1st of January 2015 not on 31st December as agreed by the Asean economic ministers in their earlier meeting. The key reason was quite simple - a delay of 364 days would allow most of the Asean members additional time and room to implement remaining measures and prepare for the AC arrival with better preparedness. The majority of Asean members seemed to prefer the last day of 2015 as they thought the AC is a process that would continue beyond 2015. Rightly so, during the summit on Sunday, Prime Minister Hun Sen decided to go for 31st December as the date.

It appears this AC is operating on Thai time...instead of kicking off bright & early on the first day 2015 as implied in all the hype they will instead wait until the last day of 2015 to officially start the AC. Throw in the New Years Day and first of the year holiday period and it looks like the first possible business day in 2016 is 4 Jan. So, all the hype we hear about AC kicking off in 2015 really means it kicking off o/a 4 Jan 2016 for daily business transaction purposes. Yeap, operating on Thai time.

[MaxLee]

The truth about why Thailand doesn't move is that its governmental leaders are too stubborn to stick by their ultimate comfort zone:

FACE and CORRUPTION

Several things have been missing for years and years after generation decades, to quickly name the most problematic ones:

1. Education system: So called New policies like "Speak-more English-campaign with sponsored by the English Prime Minister, and 'haven't you ever heard-offs" which do not really bring long term profits and stir up motivation for millions of Thais to study any English; secondly, students nationwide, still suffer under "tests, tests, tests, and exams after exams after exams", wasting so many hours of their youthful lives just to pass tests, after tests, after exams after exams, under a school system which doesn't really prepare them for the real life and doesn't really foster anything that these young kids really want to learn.

2. Referring to my first point of education: Degrees in Thailand are more important than the real skill; you just need the piece of paper, and family clan members will do everything in their power to save your sorry face and cover up your mistakes.

3. Corruption exists just everywhere in Thailand, especially in the Tourism industry, who cover up the 'mysterious deaths of young adventurers who mysteriously die on mysterious poisening or covered up murders on certain islands. The affected family members won't ever be compensated, because the TAT and their branch operators are too busy "maintaining and clinching to their Tourism image and saving face"

4. Infrastructure has never been improved for years, nor do the various agencies, traffic control management, telecommunication departments like NBTC, or the BMTA and etc. really care. In short they are trying to run modern technology or plan to run future high speed bullet trains on a broken infrastructure which hasn't even been invested or re-built or restructured in the first place; The 3G case is another issue, almost every other ASEAN country already has 4G or even higher, but people in Thailand will probably go through many more stages of finalization and legal evaluation process, only to wait for another few more years until things finally get finalized,... but there is always something wrong and people in Thailand would have to wait another decade term in order to get another finalization process in order to get their official 3G licenses...; finally the Rice scheme is full of corruption on its own...

5. Lastly,... the rich and powerful elite in Thailand can just break the law and get away with everything, including murder: high status people like one of the senators who "accidently killed a secretary woman" during a dinner, or a RED BULL heir who killed a cop and got bail....

Those examples are the reason why Thailand hasn't moved forward.

ASEAN standards,... for Thaland???? Don't make me laugh...

[Padoek]

A small fish in a big pond had better learn how to swim with the sharks.

[bunta71]

The many grammar mistakes in this article written by an educated journalist underscores the long road ahead...

[LuukKoeyKorat]

'Let Learn English" campaign by the Ministry of Education......should be changed to "Let's Learn Grammar First" campaign ;-)

[livinthailandos]

I could be in a small minority on what i'm about to say but ( will thailand even make it to 2015 )

1. Thailand has a long history of many government's and coups so to me thailand will never have anything long enough or stable enough to make any real changes or progress so as far as asean thailand shouldn't even speak or try

2. Asean won't mean anything to thailand if the people in power here won't have any real changes in the south, I say its only a matter of when the events that happen in the south happen in bangkok. southern thailand might as well be turning into iraq.

Again maybe i'm being unrealistic but I don't see anything changing even when asean happens especially as backward as thailand is

[RisqEM]

First step for the Ministry of Educations English program is to write the name of the program correctly!!! It's not "Let Learn English", but rather "Let's Learn English". Just saying if they're worried about it, maybe they should start using spellcheck........

[jaltsc]

First step for the Ministry of Educations English program is to write the name of the program correctly!!! It's not "Let Learn English", but rather "Let's Learn English". Just saying if they're worried about it, maybe they should start using spellcheck........

I believe using spell check would admit making a mistake. Thus, losing face. I think you can see where this is going.

BTW...It should be "Ministry of Education's English program". Sorry, I had grammar Nazi in the 4th grade. I still shudder when I hear "to who" instead of "to whom". Even the parents were scared shitless to question her. However, maybe she is the type of teacher needed in the Thai education system.

[andid]

There is a far more serious issue at hand here.

The various media reports have highlighted that the AEC will be with us in 2015. There are 5 key parts to the AEC - goods, services, investments, labour and capital. Various reports over the last few years have told us of the many changes we can expect. These include, wrongly, that labour (people) will be able to travel freely, companies will be able to easily own and operate businesses in other ASEAN countries (also wrong), investments will be protected (also mainly wrong) and so on.

Some of the changes are already in place (eg lower tariffs on ASEAN goods moving from one ASEAN country to another), while others are supposed to be in place but are not yet (Mutual Recognition Agreements within the Free Movement of Skilled Labour category, and ASEAN ownership of services companies of at least 51 and then 70%). Despite this, various media outlets and government officials have been suggesting Jan 1st 2015 was to start a whole new era.

Business people have been making investment and planning decisions based on what they have been told by the media, government officials, and even some elected ministers (of both sides) for the last 3 years or more. They have made assumptions on how the business environment would operate at a certain point in time. To highlight an example, some factory operators have chosen to establish operations in Thailand or in Cambodia or in Indonesia based on what they have been told the ASEAN and various countries rules would be.

Now we have been told there will be a delay of at least 1 year. This may create serious problems for investors. It will be even worse if some of the countries delay the changes further, or even worse, if the changes are not made in the way they have been portrayed. A clear example of this is that most people think Filippina nurses will be able to move and work in the Medical (Tourism) Industry in Thailand as nursing is one of the 8 professions covered under the Mutual Recognition Agreements, and some providers have made investments in new buildings, equipment and marketing based on this information. The real detail within the Nursing MRA, says only that nurses can travel to other ASEAN countries for the purposes of studying best practices. There is not even any detail within the agreements if such a study tour will require work permits or under what visas.

Some, if not many investors, will be losing considerable amounts of money, and this delay, and lack of certainty, is likely to damage the reputation of Thailand and other ASEAN countries.

[Tatsujin]

. . . train wreck . . .

[Thai at Heart]

There is a far more serious issue at hand here.

The various media reports have highlighted that the AEC will be with us in 2015. There are 5 key parts to the AEC - goods, services, investments, labour and capital. Various reports over the last few years have told us of the many changes we can expect. These include, wrongly, that labour (people) will be able to travel freely, companies will be able to easily own and operate businesses in other ASEAN countries (also wrong), investments will be protected (also mainly wrong) and so on.

Some of the changes are already in place (eg lower tariffs on ASEAN goods moving from one ASEAN country to another), while others are supposed to be in place but are not yet (Mutual Recognition Agreements within the Free Movement of Skilled Labour category, and ASEAN ownership of services companies of at least 51 and then 70%). Despite this, various media outlets and government officials have been suggesting Jan 1st 2015 was to start a whole new era.

Business people have been making investment and planning decisions based on what they have been told by the media, government officials, and even some elected ministers (of both sides) for the last 3 years or more. They have made assumptions on how the business environment would operate at a certain point in time. To highlight an example, some factory operators have chosen to establish operations in Thailand or in Cambodia or in Indonesia based on what they have been told the ASEAN and various countries rules would be.

Now we have been told there will be a delay of at least 1 year. This may create serious problems for investors. It will be even worse if some of the countries delay the changes further, or even worse, if the changes are not made in the way they have been portrayed. A clear example of this is that most people think Filippina nurses will be able to move and work in the Medical (Tourism) Industry in Thailand as nursing is one of the 8 professions covered under the Mutual Recognition Agreements, and some providers have made investments in new buildings, equipment and marketing based on this information. The real detail within the Nursing MRA, says only that nurses can travel to other ASEAN countries for the purposes of studying best practices. There is not even any detail within the agreements if such a study tour will require work permits or under what visas.

Some, if not many investors, will be losing considerable amounts of money, and this delay, and lack of certainty, is likely to damage the reputation of Thailand and other ASEAN countries.

What's new? Bmw has a massive factory built in Rayong on the back of a declared plan years ago that autos would have unified excise.

Until Malaysia put the kaibosh on that plan to protect proton. The interesting one will be subsidiary ownership issues. Open up in one place, own the subsidiary 100% in another part. That would cause massive ructions in certain industries.

[scotbeve]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

Unfortunately, it's been this way from day dot (caste system).

[scotbeve]

I could be in a small minority on what i'm about to say but ( will thailand even make it to 2015 )

1. Thailand has a long history of many government's and coups so to me thailand will never have anything long enough or stable enough to make any real changes or progress so as far as asean thailand shouldn't even speak or try

2. Asean won't mean anything to thailand if the people in power here won't have any real changes in the south, I say its only a matter of when the events that happen in the south happen in bangkok. southern thailand might as well be turning into iraq.

Again maybe i'm being unrealistic but I don't see anything changing even when asean happens especially as backward as thailand is

The south was taken care of / looked after a helluva lot better than the upper north of Thailand was for an extreme amount of years.... Take a visit up here and talk to some old folks!!!

Long regimes in ASEAN are just that (Suharto & family, the Lee's, Mahatir, Marcos, etc. shall I go on???) they eat, and eat , and eat!!

[Thai at Heart]

I could be in a small minority on what i'm about to say but ( will thailand even make it to 2015 )

1. Thailand has a long history of many government's and coups so to me thailand will never have anything long enough or stable enough to make any real changes or progress so as far as asean thailand shouldn't even speak or try

2. Asean won't mean anything to thailand if the people in power here won't have any real changes in the south, I say its only a matter of when the events that happen in the south happen in bangkok. southern thailand might as well be turning into iraq.

Again maybe i'm being unrealistic but I don't see anything changing even when asean happens especially as backward as thailand is

The south was taken care of / looked after a helluva lot better than the upper north of Thailand was for an extreme amount of years.... Take a visit up here and talk to some old folks!!!

Long regimes in ASEAN are just that (Suharto & family, the Lee's, Mahatir, Marcos, etc. shall I go on???) they eat, and eat , and eat!!

Indeed, the south has had a massively greater attention put on it historically. And then forget the north, what about isaan?

Asean will influence Thailand as little as the money of Thailand will allow it to.

[Markaew]

There is a far more serious issue at hand here.

The various media reports have highlighted that the AEC will be with us in 2015. There are 5 key parts to the AEC - goods, services, investments, labour and capital. Various reports over the last few years have told us of the many changes we can expect. These include, wrongly, that labour (people) will be able to travel freely, companies will be able to easily own and operate businesses in other ASEAN countries (also wrong), investments will be protected (also mainly wrong) and so on.

Some of the changes are already in place (eg lower tariffs on ASEAN goods moving from one ASEAN country to another), while others are supposed to be in place but are not yet (Mutual Recognition Agreements within the Free Movement of Skilled Labour category, and ASEAN ownership of services companies of at least 51 and then 70%). Despite this, various media outlets and government officials have been suggesting Jan 1st 2015 was to start a whole new era.

Business people have been making investment and planning decisions based on what they have been told by the media, government officials, and even some elected ministers (of both sides) for the last 3 years or more. They have made assumptions on how the business environment would operate at a certain point in time. To highlight an example, some factory operators have chosen to establish operations in Thailand or in Cambodia or in Indonesia based on what they have been told the ASEAN and various countries rules would be.

Now we have been told there will be a delay of at least 1 year. This may create serious problems for investors. It will be even worse if some of the countries delay the changes further, or even worse, if the changes are not made in the way they have been portrayed. A clear example of this is that most people think Filippina nurses will be able to move and work in the Medical (Tourism) Industry in Thailand as nursing is one of the 8 professions covered under the Mutual Recognition Agreements, and some providers have made investments in new buildings, equipment and marketing based on this information. The real detail within the Nursing MRA, says only that nurses can travel to other ASEAN countries for the purposes of studying best practices. There is not even any detail within the agreements if such a study tour will require work permits or under what visas.

Some, if not many investors, will be losing considerable amounts of money, and this delay, and lack of certainty, is likely to damage the reputation of Thailand and other ASEAN countries.

Isn't that how Thailand handles everything? Misleading you into emptying your wallet. Profit above all else. Excellent post by the way.

[SouthernMan3]

"The billion-baht worth of AEC campaign is zeroed in on with one single issue: to prepare the country and Thai people to compete with other nine members in the Asean Economic Community by 2015."

If this is REALLY true, where are all the English teachers we need ?

​Much more important than this dumb tablet campaign.

[Tanaka]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

"I love my government... I love my government...I love my government..." "Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world..."

I thought they were taught that Thailand is the world. So there is no need to worry or think about anything else.

[Tatsujin]

"Amazingly, nobody really tackles the real issue of the country's rotten education system, which has produced walking human tape-recorders than the much needed innovative minds."

"I love my government... I love my government...I love my government..." "Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world...Thailand best country in world..."

I thought they were taught that Thailand is the world. So there is no need to worry or think about anything else.

Finally! Some other people here at last that don't wear rose-tinted spectacles!

[Baerboxer]

The truth about why Thailand doesn't move is that its governmental leaders are too stubborn to stick by their ultimate comfort zone:

FACE and CORRUPTION

Several things have been missing for years and years after generation decades, to quickly name the most problematic ones:

1. Education system: So called New policies like "Speak-more English-campaign with sponsored by the English Prime Minister, and 'haven't you ever heard-offs" which do not really bring long term profits and stir up motivation for millions of Thais to study any English; secondly, students nationwide, still suffer under "tests, tests, tests, and exams after exams after exams", wasting so many hours of their youthful lives just to pass tests, after tests, after exams after exams, under a school system which doesn't really prepare them for the real life and doesn't really foster anything that these young kids really want to learn.

2. Referring to my first point of education: Degrees in Thailand are more important than the real skill; you just need the piece of paper, and family clan members will do everything in their power to save your sorry face and cover up your mistakes.

3. Corruption exists just everywhere in Thailand, especially in the Tourism industry, who cover up the 'mysterious deaths of young adventurers who mysteriously die on mysterious poisening or covered up murders on certain islands. The affected family members won't ever be compensated, because the TAT and their branch operators are too busy "maintaining and clinching to their Tourism image and saving face"

4. Infrastructure has never been improved for years, nor do the various agencies, traffic control management, telecommunication departments like NBTC, or the BMTA and etc. really care. In short they are trying to run modern technology or plan to run future high speed bullet trains on a broken infrastructure which hasn't even been invested or re-built or restructured in the first place; The 3G case is another issue, almost every other ASEAN country already has 4G or even higher, but people in Thailand will probably go through many more stages of finalization and legal evaluation process, only to wait for another few more years until things finally get finalized,... but there is always something wrong and people in Thailand would have to wait another decade term in order to get another finalization process in order to get their official 3G licenses...; finally the Rice scheme is full of corruption on its own...

5. Lastly,... the rich and powerful elite in Thailand can just break the law and get away with everything, including murder: high status people like one of the senators who "accidently killed a secretary woman" during a dinner, or a RED BULL heir who killed a cop and got bail....

Those examples are the reason why Thailand hasn't moved forward.

ASEAN standards,... for Thaland???? Don't make me laugh...

I agree with most of what you say. But, these things are not unique to Thailand and most if not all of your underlying points could be contextualise to any of the countries in South East Asia and the Indian sub-continent.

What is said is that Thailand should have develped into one of the leading nations in the developing world but has been held back by the few who want to preserve their priviliged way of life.

[easyas]

First step for the Ministry of Educations English program is to write the name of the program correctly!!! It's not "Let Learn English", but rather "Let's Learn English". Just saying if they're worried about it, maybe they should start using spellcheck........

Same same you!

"Educations" = Education's

"Just saying if they're worried about it" - what mean you? Gibberish!

"spellcheck" = spellchecker

[scotbeve]

Pardon me ..... Issarn as well! Sorry, don't know why that didn't work as a quote but the reply here was meant for >>>

Edited November 19, 2012 by scotbeve