The Prime Minister gave a special lecture on ASEAN Economic Outlook 2025, emphasizing ASEAN economic cooperation, viewing it as one of the world’s largest markets, accelerating the promotion of member countries’ GDP, highlighting the advantages of no conflict, suitable for investment, preparing to use the ASEAN Summit stage to discuss flooding and global warming issues.
At 9:30 a.m., Ms. Paethongtarn Shinawatra, Prime Minister, gave a special lecture on the topic of ‘Thailand Economic Big Move’ at the ASEAN Economic Outlook 2025: The Rise of ASEAN, A Renewing Opportunity seminar at the Chatra Ballroom, 2nd floor, Siam Kempinski Hotel, Rama I Road, Pathumwan District, Bangkok.
Ms. Paethongtarn said that at 38 years old, if she were in other businesses, no one would say she was young. But when it comes to politics, 38 years old is considered young. But no matter how old you are, if you open yourself up to work opportunities, you will have new energy and ideas, along with the older generation who can come to
support you as consultants. Therefore, she wants Thailand to gradually change, and right now, it is clear that there are more people of all ages in many organizations.
The Prime Minister said that last week he had just returned from the ACD (Asia Cooperation Dialogue) meeting in Qatar. This forum is an important forum because the framework of the discussion is about the world’s geopolitical challenges (New Multipolar World Order), and Thailand, as the country that initiated this forum, will be the chair and host of the meeting next year.
This year marks ASEAN’s 57th anniversary. We have been building this partnership for more than half a century. Over the past years, ASEAN has constantly adapted, changed its goals and approaches to the economic, social and technological conditions.
As at the time of its establishment in the 1960s, conflicts and wars were still major problems in our region. ASEAN played an important role in promoting stability among its member countries.
After that, ASEAN changed its appro
ach by changing the battlefield into a trading field, which led to the creation of the economy that has been the foundation of the present.
And in the 1990s, ASEAN led by Thailand developed itself into a full-fledged free trade area, expanding trade and investment cooperation with other economic groups such as APEC, which was born at that time.
The Prime Minister said that today, he would like to use this stage to tell everyone about the goals of the Thai government as a member country that he wants to push forward, which will have a great impact on the next decade of ASEAN, with a total of 4 issues.
First, the GDP of the 10 ASEAN member countries today is worth a combined 3.6 trillion US dollars or 119 trillion baht and is expected to continue to grow by another 4-5% per year in the future. It is the world’s fifth largest market and has a population of over 670 million people. ASEAN is therefore considered one of the world’s largest markets.
At this time, ASEAN needs to unlock its economic potential to i
ncrease trade opportunities. Member countries need to unite in the economy, making the ASEAN market have trade, investment and taxation regulations that are consistent throughout the region to make investors feel that investing in member countries or Thailand is equal to investing in the ASEAN region, attracting more investment.
The next issue is that ASEAN is a peaceful region, with no international conflicts, and has economic prosperity (Peace and Prosperity), which are important features that are suitable for investment. It is also a good geopolitical location, and is a negotiation area to reduce global conflicts, especially at this time when the world is experiencing serious conflicts.
While ASEAN has the advantage of supporting free trade and investment, many countries, despite conflicts, can make a living without problems in the ASEAN region. For example, investors from China have diversified their investments in ASEAN countries in many areas. In addition, investors from the United States, Japan, Sout
h Korea, and Taiwan have shown interest and increased their investments in technology products, such as semiconductors and Google’s investment in building data centers, as well as Apple’s production of mobile phones and computers.
ASEAN has also played a role in de-escalating tensions between major powers on several occasions, such as using Thailand as a forum for talks between China’s foreign minister and the US president’s national security adviser a few months ago.
However, ASEAN still has internal conflicts within its member states, namely the conflict in Myanmar. This is an important issue that ASEAN must resolve.
Therefore, ASEAN must play an important role in bringing peace back to Myanmar as soon as possible. We will focus on working with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, who will assume the ASEAN Chairship next year, and use diplomatic mechanisms to resolve this issue as soon as possible.
The next issue is transportation, which connects countries together. This will be the key to enhancing
ASEAN’s potential. In the future, ASEAN must connect the international transportation systems on Asian soil, connecting the entire system, so that goods can be sent to each other conveniently. We must jointly develop transportation infrastructure on land, water, and air, build roads, build high-speed trains, and develop ports.
All of these are being implemented by Thailand: double-track railway, high-speed train, becoming a regional aviation hub, and Land Bridge, which will be a transportation hub. The image we see is a variety of products, including the image of a large port connecting the two oceans, the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea, which will reduce expenses and production costs for all businesses, and in the future, ASEAN will become another transportation hub for the world.
The last issue, environmental issues, is now global warming, not global warming, because the severity of natural disasters will increase every year, including Thailand, which has been severely affected by flooding, such as
Chiang Rai. I went to see it with my own eyes. I want you to think that if our houses were covered in mud, it would be sad and not just this year, it might happen again next year. Therefore, we must prepare to deal with global warming, which may cause unexpected changes. It is a question that we must think about how much we can prevent because these problems will take many years to solve, whether it is building a dam or a barrier. Repairing it will not take long, but building it requires studying and having an ABC plan in order to wait for the time to build these things in the country.
The Prime Minister said that we are now accelerating the policies to see practical results. All of this is something that he will discuss with ASEAN member countries in Laos at the meeting that will start tomorrow, which is in line with the Master Plan of ASEAN Connectivity 2025, which has 3 main concepts:
1. Physical connectivity, focusing on improving transportation infrastructure
; 2. Regulatory connectivity, aiming to ad
just policies, regulations, and standards to be consistent among member countries to promote trade and investment;
3. People-to-people connectivity, focusing on cultural exchanges, education, tourism, and labor movement to facilitate more convenience in order to create a sustainable ASEAN future together with member countries.
As a region that has successfully developed the common interests of member countries, including being able to create bargaining power with trading partners around the world, it reflects the idea that living together in unity creates more power than working separately. ASEAN together is much more than the sum of its parts.
Source: Thai News Agency