Economy: Shifting Thailand into the 'third wave'

[trogers]

"We believe we will become the international trading hub of Asia"

Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!!!! I was waiting such a long time for yet another "Thailand will be hub of...." statement. What a relief!!! I am assured that my daily egesta will be discharged in a much smoother way now, knowing such a bright hub future lies ahead for Thailand...

Already is a hub - for human trafficking?

[Thai at Heart]

They would have to raise the educational standards to support innovation of which Thailand currently has zero. Hard to see how that would happen. The elite do not want an educated public demanding rights and pushing for real democracy like Korea in the 80's.

China has no real Democracy and doing well.

You need education or cheap labor, no corruption and good infrastructure.

Thailand is not so bad on the infrastructure.....But if you have some production machines and sometimes the electric is missing for 2-3 seconds (1 second the machine might be able to do) than you really love it.....

I didn't say that Thailand needs to have democracy. I merely pointed out that fear of pressure to democratize is one reason, among many, that Thailand refuses to develop a first-world education system, which it does need if it is to compete in high tech industries.

China doesn't have democracy, but it does have areas like Shanghai with first world-level education. Published research in China has now passed that of Japan, although the quality of that research probably does not not approach that of Japan or the US. China is doing well compared to its own past, but, to keep it in perspective, per capita GDP in China is currently slightly lower than Thailand.

Infrastructure is necessary, but not sufficient, to become a fully-developed economy. What is necessary is innovation for which high-quality education is required. Singapore, with its 5 million people, has two universities among the top ten in Asia. Thailand's universities keep sliding down in the rankings within Asia. Thailand is not even keeping pace, much less surpassing its neighbors in education.

The past thirty years of high growth in Thailand have been based just on renting out cheap labor, migrated from the agricultural sector, to foreign companies. That strategy has produced a big leap in living standards compared to two generations ago, but it not going to be enough get Thailand into high tech industries. After 30 years of making autos and hard drives for foreign companies there is not a single Thai company that makes and exports either of those products, unlike, say, Korea. Thailand's exports, other than products of foreign companies, are just food products and rubber, the same as 50 years ago. The Thai elite is content to cash in on renting out the lower classes and is not going to make the necessary changes to compete with the fully-developed countries.

While I agree in general there are a few things I don't agree: "Thailand is not even keeping pace, much less surpassing its neighbors in education." While I agree that there a big problems in the education but which of the neighbours are surpassing Thailand? Malaysia is doing OK, but a big part of the population is very resistant to education, Lao, Myanmar or Cambodia?

Thailand is exporting a lot cars and car parts. Only they don't have own brands, but when I look to Europe only Germany, Italy and France has own brands (I may forgot some small companies) all others are since a long time just brands for sale but belong to one of few the big companies.

In the 2012 PISA scores Thailand scored number 50 out of 65.. The only participating Asian country that scored lower was Malaysia at 52. The top seven countries are all Asian.

http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2013/dec/03/pisa-results-country-best-reading-maths-science

The owners of the manufacturing companies get the profits while the workers just get (low) wages. The S. Koreans insisted on technology transfer when they allowed Japanese auto companies to open plants there. Now they export their own competitive brands internationally. When China hired Siemens to build their first bullet train in Shanghai they insisted on technology transfer and recently they provided the low bid against Siemens to build a bullet train in California. Thailand has not only failed to develop any new technology, but they have failed even to transfer existing technology so that they can build Thai-owned companies for high-value added export. The reason is that Thai companies do not want to compete internationally. They are content to export food products and rent out cheap labor.

The idea that Thailand will compete in new technologies like nanotech is laughable.

The domestic Thai businesses are focussed on exploiting the Thai market through protection and spreading regionally. Look at the list of protected Thai industry and all of them are dominated by 2 or 3 Thai Chinese companies.

Korean companies are Korean. Japanese companies are Japanese. Thai companies are Thai Chinese. Nuff said.

Does Thai business ever think of venture capital to fund ANYTHING in Thailand?

Edited July 1, 2015 by Thai at Heart