Patrick Cooke: ALL BLOG POSTS
Despite a rising tide of international trade protectionism and ongoing political uncertainty at home, a significant majority of executives who participated in OBG’s second ever Thailand Business Barometer indicated that their firms planned significant capital investments in the year ahead.
Following a number of recent political and economic challenges in the country, Thailand’s C-suite executives remain notably optimistic about local business conditions in Oxford Business Group’s second CEO Survey on the Thai economy. As well as providing optimistic responses on their short-term investment plans, respondents implicitly underscored their commitment to Thailand’s long-term strategy to become a high-income, valuebased economy, citing engineering, leadership, research and computer technology as their top-four long-term workforce requirements, thereby closely aligning with the objectives of the government’s Thailand 4.0 agenda.
From the overthrow of an elected government to the death of a beloved king, Thailand has undergone serious upheaval in recent years. The state of flux in politics and society has been mirrored in the wider economy, with several years of weak consumption, falling foreign direct investment (FDI) and sluggish growth in comparison to the other emerging markets in ASEAN.