Industry Ministry approves medical-goods production zone

Hathai Authai, deputy director-general of the Office of Industrial Economics, said a committee in charge of developing the estate, chaired by Industry Ministry permanent secretary Vitoon Simachokdee, yesterday approved in principle a plan to have the Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand establish the centre.

Under the plan, the IEAT will likely team up with the private sector to develop the zone, Hathai said.

One private company is already developing a site in Kanchanaburi to house small and medium-sized enterprises producing medical equipment, health products, herbal medicines and beauty products. The zone would comprise 500-rai (80-hectare) land plots. Japanese investors and SMEs with expertise in these fields will be targeted. 

Hathai said the developer of the zone might join with the IEAT to build infrastructure including test laboratories, a research-and-development centre, and production, distribution and exhibition centres. It will deploy information technology to link with related upstream and downstream parties, he said.

The meeting also assigned the Federation of Thai Industries to set up a one-stop medical-equipment testing service for manufacturers. The government might be asked to provide financial support to develop this service in the first phase. One problem facing the industry is a lack of quality-standard testing labs.

Thailand’s exports of medical equipment are worth Bt92 billion a year, accounting for less than 1 per cent of the global market, Hathai said.