Better railway 'needed to escape middle-income trap'
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Thailand must "reform" its railway system if it is to leap out of the middle-income trap it has been stuck in for decades, while experts say it is time for the country to improve its economy by reinvesting in the rail network, a symposium has heard.
Speaking at a “Thailand Rail Academy Symposium” yesterday, Charnchai Suwisuttagul, deputy permanent secretary of the Transport Ministry, said that the rail industry would be the key driver of economic growth.
As part of the country’s strategic development plans, he said, railways with a combined length of 887 kilometres were set for construction, starting next year.
He said this would be added to the current railway network of about 4,000km, increasing the proportion of rail from 1.5 per cent to 5 per cent of all transport modes by 2022. The road system comprises almost 90 per cent of all modes.
“If Thailand sets a target to jump out of the middle-income trap to become a high-income country, what it needs first is rail-system reform,” said Pichet Durongkaveroj, secretary-general of the National Science Technology and Innovation Policy Office.
He said this reform did not mean the construction of infrastructure projects. The county’s gross domestic product would be higher as a result of better income distribution.
Among Asean countries, Malaysia has announced that it plans to become a developed country by 2030, while China is now on a par with Thailand in terms of income per head per year at US$5,000 (Bt160,000).
Pichet said that for Thailand to overcome the middle-income trap, GDP per capita had to be higher than $13,000.
He said that although the country had many strengths, including food production and its geographical advantage, it still had weaknesses such as a lack of knowledge and research and development.
To become a high-income country, he said the government needed to have a strong commitment to developing the rail infrastructure, supporting innovation activities, getting the private sector more involved in R&D, and building up human resources.
