The Bank of Thailand (BoT) has expressed concerns that this year’s export growth might contract for three years in a row and prevent the GDP growth rate from reaching 3.8%.
BoT Director Don Nakhonthap said Thai exports for the rest of the year must not be lower than 19.2 billion USD otherwise the export growth rate would not reach 0.8% as forecast by the central bank. If exports for the rest of the year were 17 billion USD/month on average, the 2015 Thai export growth would be in the negative territory for three consecutive years. The negative export growth and slowly recovering economy in the second quarter would likely result in less than 3.8% economic growth, the director said.
The BoT will revise this year’s GDP growth forecast again in late June. The bank’s director expressed his confidence that the 2015 GDP would grow by at least 2.5%.
A central bank study has found that the economy of Thailand’s trade partners was an important factor influencing Thai exports.
Thai exports recovered slowly due to the fragile economic recovery of Thailand’s main trade partners, such as countries in the Eurozone, Japan and China, the director added.
