4. Thailand

4.1 A Profile of Economic Development in Thailand
Located in the middle-south of the Indochina Peninsula, Thailand has borders with Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Malaysia, with an area of 513,115 sq km. Up to the end of 2000, Thailand had a population of 62.40 million with more than 30 ethnic groups, of which the Thai nationality is the majority, accounting for 40% of the total population.
Thailand has implemented Five-Year Plans for national economic and social development since 1961 and finished the 8th Five-Year Plan by 2001. Thailand mainly performs the free economy policy, encourages private investment and competition and guides private sectors to play a leading role in the national economic development; increase governmental investment in infrastructures to improve investment environment, vigorously introduce foreign investment and technology and make efforts to enlarge exports, while speeding up the pace of economic reform, releasing control over foreign exchange for transactions of current items and permitting foreign banks to engage in business free on board (BIBF) in Bangkok to enable Bangkok to develop to the orientation of regional international financial center. Over the recent years, Thailand has taken an active part in regional economic cooperation and joined the APEC and ASEAN Free Trade Zone. It has actively taken part in the waterway and land traffic cooperation in the sub-region of the upper reaches of Mekong among Chine, Thailand, Laos and Myanmar. It has pushed the developmental progress of the Economic Growth Triangle in the neighboring area among Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. Since the 1990s, influenced by the Persian Gulf War and domestic political situation, Thailand has experienced certain slowdown in the economic growth rate, but the average annual growth rate has still maintained at about 8%. With the development of manufacturing and service industries, especially with the abrupt rising of tourism, the economic structure of Thailand has experienced significant change, shifting gradually from an agricultural country that mainly relied on exports of agricultural products to a newly emerging industrial country.
Thailand's per capital income exceeded US$ 2,500 in 1995. The World Bank listed Thailand as a country with moderate income. The year 1997 witnessed a serous financial and economic crisis in Thailand with a large number of financial institutions and enterprises compelled to re-organize or go bankruptcy. Thailand's economic growth rate was only 0.6% for 1997. The foreign exchange reserve was reduced from US$ 39.4 billion in 1996 to US$ 27.0 billion by the end of 1997. The foreign exchange reserve was reduced from US$ 39.4 billion in 1996 to US$ 27.0 billion by the end of 1997, and foreign debts reached up to US$ 90.0 billion especially with large proportion of medium and short-term foreign loans. In 1998, Thailand carried out significant rectification in the economic and financial fields. But the extent of physical economic downslide still exceeded the anticipation, with a negative economic growth rate of 8.5%, an inflation rate of 12%, a rate of unemployment over 10% and a decrease of 20% in the per capita income. The Thailand's economy began to bottom out in the second half of 1999, and that year enjoyed a GDP growth rate of 4%, with the foreign exchange reserve rising back to US$ 34.8 billion, foreign debts lowered from US$ 93.7 billion before occurrence of the crisis to US$ 80.1 billion, the inflation rate at 2.8% and the financial deficits accounting for 6.6% of the GDP. In June 2000, Thailand announced to break away from the supervision of the IMF, the economy has gradually recovered and foreign trade has increased quickly. In 2000, the GDP of Thailand was B 5.004 trillion (US$ 125.1 billion), up 4.5% over the preceding year, and the per capita income was about B 80200 (about US$ 2,000). Foreign debts decreased from US$ 105 billion at the end of 1998 to US$ 83.9 billion in September 2000. The inflation rate in 2000 was 2.6% and the foreign exchange reserve was US$ 31.9 billion.
Thailand is rich in natural resources mainly including potash, salt, tin ore, lignite coal, bituminous shale, natural gas, as well as zinc, lead, tungsten, iron, antimony, chromium, barite, gemstone and petroleum. The reserve of potash salt ranks first worldwide and that of tin ore accounts for 125 of the world total. The reserve of bituminous shale reaches 1.87 million tons, that of lignite coal about 2 billion tons and that of natural gas about 16.4 trillion normal cubic feet. The forest coverage is 20%. Thailand has implemented open market economic policies since 1961, encouraged foreign enterprises to invest in Thailand, and adopted a series of favorable policies including allowing foreign enterprises to own land in Thailand, freedom of foreign enterprises to remit the profits to overseas, duty exemption for imported raw materials, release of foreign exchange control, etc. In the meanwhile, Thailand has continuously improved infrastructures to create a good investment environment to attract large amounts of foreign capitals. The main countries and regions that have investment environment to attract large amounts of foreign capitals. The main countries and regions that have invested in Thailand include the US, Japan, Taiwan of China, the UK, Singapore, Australia, Holland, etc. Main fields for investment include service, petroleum exploitation, mining, heavy chemical, auto assembling, household appliances, public facilities, and agricultural product processing industries.
Viewing from the overall industrial pattern of Thailand, agriculture and tourism are relatively development whereas industry is relatively backward. Agriculture and tourism are the major industries in Thailand and both are playing a more and more important role. Export of agricultural products is one of the major sources of Thailand's foreign exchange earnings. Main crops include rice, corn, manioc, rubber, sugarcane, mung bean, hemp, tobacco, coffee bean, cotton, palm oil and coconut. The cultivate area of the whole country is 20.70 million hectares, accounting for 38% of the total land area. The growth rate of agriculture was 3.9% in 1999 and 0.3% in 2000. The agricultural population is about 4.2 million, accounting for 14% of all laborers. Thailand is a world famous producer and exporter of rice. The export of rice in 1999 reached 6.71 million tons, earning about US$ 1.9 billion of foreign exchange. The export of rice in 2000 reached 6.6 million tons, earning US$ 1.74 billion of foreign exchange. Thailand is the third largest sea products producer in Asia only next to Japan and China. With an shrimp production of 100,000 tons and an output value of B 33.6 billion in 1999, it is the largest shrimp producer. The production output of rubber ranks first worldwide, reaching 2.1 million tons, 90% of which is for export.
The tourist industry in Thailand has experienced a rapid development over the recent years and become one of the main sources for Thailand's foreign exchange earnings. The number of man-times of foreign tourists to Thailand up rushed from 2.4 million in 1985 to 5.2 million in 1990. Influenced by such political affairs as the May Bloodshed Incident and political change in 1992, the tourist industry experienced certain sliding. After 1993 the tourist industry began to recovery gradually. The number of man-times of foreign tourists to Thailand exceeded 8.58 million, with foreign exchange earnings of about US$ 9.3 billion. In 2000 Thailand received 9.12 million foreign tourists, an increase of 6.27% with foreign exchange earnings of US$ 7.294 billion. Tourists mainly come form Japan, Malaysia, China, Singapore, Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan of China. The number of visitors from China has also increase by a large margin in the past two years. According to the statistics of Thailand's tourism institution, Chinese visitors to Thailand totaled about 775,000, slightly lower than the figure for the previous year (810,000).
Influenced by the financial crisis in Asia, Thailand's industry experienced a decrease in 1997, and the industrial growth rate decreased from 7.75 in 1996 to 0.7% for that year. The industrial growth rate for 1998 was-12.6%. The economy began to recover in 1999 with an industrial growth rate of 7.8%. The growth rate in 2000 reached 5.7%. Main industrial categories include mining, textile, electronics, plastics, food processing, toy making, auto assembling, building materials and petrochemical. To attain the target of becoming the auto assembling center of Southeast Asia, Thailand has implemented liberalization of the auto industry since 1991, resulting in rapid development. There are now 15 automobile factories, and the output value of the automobile and related industries has exceeded B 300 billion, ranking first in Southeast Asia.

4.2 Development situation and Trend of Thailand's Communication Industry
After pulling through the Asian financial crisis, in order to push the development of the IT industry, which is the most critical to the economic development, countries in Southeast Asia are speeding up their construction of communication infrastructure and promote competition in the communications market. Among these countries, Singapore and Malaysia have opened up communication operation for a long time, and Thailand, which is currently lagging behind, is trying its utmost to catch up .
The Thailand governments is carrying out privatization of the state-run communication industry. The main actions include re-organization of two currently state-run telephone companies with the share-holding system, allowing foreign capitals to hold a large share and establishing privately-run communication companies. The Thailand government has founded an institution similar to the American Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to supervise the communication market and establish a system structure that benefits the fair competition among communication companies.
The two companies subject to privatization this time are TOT which operates in domestic communication business and CAT which engages in international postal business. The Thailand governmental has decided to separate the postal business and the communication business of CAT. Currently these two communication companies have planned to first sell 25% of their stock shares to foreign companies, and after completion of re-organization with the share-holding system and listing, the proportion of foreign shares will be further increased stage wise by 42%. Of the remaining 33% shares held by the state, 3% may be held by employees of the companies, and the Thailand government will ultimately hold 30% of the stock shares.
On 11 December, 2001, the cabinet of Thailand revised the Article 8 of the Law on Communications Services previously adopted on 10 December, and in principle agreed to raise the proportion in foreign capitals from 25% to 49%. Moreover, the Thailand government has promised to the World Trade Organization (WTO) that wholly foreign-owned share-holding communication companies can be established by 2006. While driving the privatization in the communication industry, the Thailand government will lower the currently high telephone charge to stimulate the development of domestic communication and IT market.
As the Thailand National Electronics and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC) points out, the National IT 2010 Policy will focus on the construction of information infrastructures orienting to human resource exploitation and knowledge economy. Governments at all levels of the whole country should re-comprehend the IT plan on the basis of the above. The NNECTEC is now formulating a basic plan to establish the order of priority of national ICT for the period 2002-2006, which will be publicized in January.
The following groups of data show the construction situation of communication technology facilities in Thailand in recent years.
1996-1999: computer possession per thousand people in Thailand is 16.67, 19.93, 21.59 and 22.66 sets respectively.
1996-2000: Intel mainframe possession per ten thousand people is 1.57, 2.15, 4.26, 4.6 and 8.84 sets respectively.
1996-1999: possession of telephone main toll routes per thousand people is 70,80.2,83.5 and 85.7 respectively.
1996-1999: average local telephone charge (dollars per 3 minutes) is 0.11, 0.09, 0.07 and 0.08 respectively.
Internet logging on: 131,000 people in January 1998, accounting for 0.2% of the total population; 1 million people in March 2000, accounting for 1.65% of the total population (source: Newsbytes Asia); 1.2 million people in December 2000, accounting for 1.96% of the total population. (Source: IDC Research).
The year 2001 witnessed the fierce price competition in Thailand's domestic mobile telephone services, which resulted in the sharp increase in the number of mobile phone users. According to statistics, the number of mobile users in Thailand reached 7 million by the end of 2001. Currently the largest mobile communications company is Advance Information Service with 4 million users; the second largest is Total Access Communication with 2.3 million users; the third largest is Digital Phone with 5000,000 users. These three companies together have monopolized almost the whole of the mobile communications market in Thailand. TA orange, the joint venture company by CP, Thailand's largest multinational enterprise groups, and the famous British mobile telephone operator Wodafone, have already offered trial service since 14 December, 2001. The company aims at attracting 2 million users by the end of 2002 and thus breaking the highly monopolized pattern of Thailand's mobile telecommunication business. Although the two domestic mobile communication companies have users accounting for 90% of the national total of users, the number of mobile phone users only accounts for 5% of the total population. Therefore, even for new comers into the market, there is still considerable space for development

4.3 An Analysis on Electronic Information Products Market in Thailand
4.3.1 Overall analysis on electronic information product market in Thailand
The market amount of electronic products in Thailand was US$ 7.51 billion for the year 1998, down 14.6% from 1997, among which ,that of electronic components ranked first, amounting to US$ 3.699 billion and accounting for 49.3% of the total market amount. Followed next were electronic data processing products, which enjoyed a market amount of US$ 1.498 billion, accounting for 19.9% of the total.
The market amount of electronic products in Thailand was US$ 7.928 billion for the year 1999, up 5.6% over 1998, among which, that of electronic components ranked first, amounting to US$ 3.978 billion, up 7.5% over 1998, and accounting for 50.2% of the total market amount. Followed next were electronic data processing products, which enjoyed a market amount of US$ 1.557 billion, up 3.9% over 1998, accounting for 19.6% of the total. The following figure shows the development Thailand's electronics market in recent years.
4.3.2 Market Analysis on Various Electronic Products in Thailand
1. Computer and software market in Thailand
The computer market in Thailand during the 1990s grew at an average annual rate of 25%. The sales value of Thailand's computer software market during 1999-2000 totaled about B 7 billion (about US$ 200 million), with PPC accounting for 53% of market share, computer service 18%, kit software 14%, system, software 10% and data communication 4%.
In 1999, Thailand's export value of automatic data processors and their spare parts was US$ 8.06 billion, up 3.3% over the preceding year and accounting for 13.8% of Thailand's total exports. Major markets for the exports include the US, Singapore, Holland and Japan, etc., The import value of computers and their spare parts was US$ 2.418 billion, up 21.9% over the preceding year and accounting for 4.8% of Thailand's total imports. 10% of the products produced by 300 small-size software companies are for export; on the other hand, Thailand's import value of communication facilities and software totals about US$ 283 million each year.
In 1999, Thailand's import of computers and their spare parts from China totaled US$ 436 million, up 35% over the preceding year and accounting for 17.7% of Thailand's total imports. The export of computers and their spare parts to China was US$ 344 million, down 34.7% from the preceding year and accounting for 18.55 of Thailand's total exports.
2. Market situation of Thailand's main electronic products in recent years
The market situation of Thailand's main electronic products in 2001 is shown in the following Table.

3. Foreign trade of Thailand's electronic products
Over the past decade of international trade. Thailand has been not only an important exporter of agricultural products and foods, but also an important exporter of electronics and electrical appliances. The electronics and electrical appliances industries are major ones in Thailand for exporting and earning foreign exchange. Among Thailand's top ten export products are computer and its components, integrated circuit, air-conditioner, refrigerator and color TV. Major markets for export include the US, Japan, Hong Kong, Germany and the UK. In 2000, foreign exchange earned by export of electronic products and electrical appliances reached US$ 26.038 billion, accounting for 37.28% of the total export earnings.
Countries in Southeast Asia have enjoyed a favorable balance of trade in electronic products, such is also the case with Thailand. The total import of electronic products for 1997 was US$ 8.662 billion whereas the total export of electronics for the same period was US$ 14.519 billion, presenting a favorable balance of US$ 5.857 billion. Affected by the financial crisis, the import for 1998 decreased to US$ 7.652 billion, a decrease of up to 11.7% ; in contrast, the export of electronic products in Thailand for the same period exhibited n increase, with total export reaching US$ 14.719 billion, up 1.5% over the preceding year, thus enabling Thailand's favorable balance of trade in electronic products to increase to US$ 7.067 billion.

4.4 Information Industry Development in Thailand
4.4.1 A profile of information industry development in Thailand
In Asia, with respect to information industry, Thailand not only lags behind India-the great software power, but also has a long way to go compared with Singapore, Malaysia and other adjacent countries. Therefore, recently Thai Government issued series of policies and plans, to prop up those enterprises in relation to information technology, so as to reduce the gap and strengthen competitiveness.
To realize the long-tern national target of changing towards knowledge-based society, Thailand Government pays great attention to the development of information industry. The Prime Minister Thaksin recently decided to make the annual budget for national scientific research expenditure increased from US$ 160million to UUS$ 440 million, to develop specially the information and relevant industries. Furthermore, Thailand Government puts for the first time the information industry development into the five-year plan of national economic and social development between 2002 and 2007.
In June 2001, to unitedly plan the development of domestic information industries, Thailand set up the National Information Science and Technology Committee headed by Prime Minister Thaksin, which worked out a ten-year plan for Thailand information technology development together with National Scientific and Technological Development Office, National Electronic and Computer Technique Center. Intellectual Property Office, as well as Educational Department. According to this plan, through the method of introducing into talents and strengthening education, Thailand will increase the amount of software development and information technological personnel from current 20 thousand to 50 thousand in the near future. Thailand would provide more opportunities to small and medium software development firms for participating government projects; provide loan, tax reduction and other encouraging measures to those companies developing information technology; and set up a special committee composed of government and enterprises, so as to strengthen IT education and popularization. Thailand plans to increase within 5 years the annual output value of software industry from current US4 730 million to US$ 2 billion; and within 10 years set up preliminarily a relatively complete information industry system, which is from software development and marketing to manpower resources development.
To popularize IT in the whole society, Thailand first sets about the execution of "e-Government" plan, to spread information communication technology and improve government's work efficiency. At present, Thailand Cabinet already took the lead in realizing "no paper" in meetings, to process all documents and data through computer system, and notify the public about government's policies and measures through established special net station. Thailand Tax Office set up a system of collecting tax through network, which not only increased the efficiency but also enhanced the tax revenue. The Tourist Bureau, Export Promotion Office and other departments relating to specific industries, also began to broadly adopt modern communication means like e-Commerce.
At present, the ratio of person accessed to network in Thailand is 3.7%, which is far lower than 29.8% in Singapore and 15% in Malaysia. To further popularize information technology, Thailand government is adopting the measures like spreading wide-band network and providing preferential tax reduction to network suppliers, so as to reduce the network access expenses. At the same time, Thailand is implementing e-School Plan. It is estimated that by the end of 2003, Thailand will make more than 5000 schools in the whole country, including universities, middle schools and primary schools, access to Internet.
Thailand also plans to make peasants use more information technology in their living and production. Thailand already established IT promotion center at some remote regions, and plans to realize the target of all villages accessed to network within 5 years. To protect the healthy development of information industry, Thailand Intellectual Property Department is perfecting gradually the regulations for software exploitation patents, and taking strong measures against pirating activities in coordination with police. At the same time, Thailand is seeking actively the IT international cooperation. Thailand is one of the initiating countries for the Electronic ASEAN plan. In July 2001, Thailand held an international IT product fair, which was the largest in Thailand history. In this fair, Thailand reached cooperation agreements with USA and Japan.
An analyst here pointed out that in the aspect of information industry development, Thailand still has some shortages such as backward research and exploitation, weak infrastructure and insufficient manpower resources, etc. Therefore, Thailand shoulders heavy responsibilities to catch up with and surpass the countries with advanced information industry within its home area.
4.4.2 Software industry development in Thailand
From the 1970s to the early 1980s, the IT industry in Thailand was controlled by computer hardware industry. In the middle 1980s, Thailand Government began the process of electronic computerization. By the end of 1980s, Thailand Government formulated series of policies and strategies for developing computer software industry. In the 1990s, the Thailand Government passed through 3 main IT projects about national developments, that is Government Information Network, Thailand Social Science, and Third-generation Academic Research Network; while approved specific budget expenditure of Bs 420 billion (about US$ 12 million). During this period, software industry had changed enormously. Thailand Software Industry Association was formed and has more than 40 software companies, in addition to domestic use, the software produced by which is also exported in a large quantity. The National Electronic and Computer Technique Center also set up 6 service centers, i.e. Business Information Center, Training Center, Information Technology Center, Software Component Application Center, Approval and Appraisement Center, as well as Communication and OSI Qualification Test Center.
At present, in Thailand, there are 300 small software companies and 1000 information technology companies (among which, 20 are large-scale information technology companies), which are mainly foreign-funded and joint-venture enterprises, and possess engineering technical personnel about 9000. The computer software industry in Thailand develops very rapidly, and has vast vistas both in industry scale and market scale.
To support software industry for developing high-tech product project and production technology, Thailand Investment Promoting Committee provides the following favorable terms 21:
(1) The above-mentioned projects, no matter in which region they are established, can be exempted from income tax of legal persons.
(2) Allowed to possess land use right.
(3) Allowed to bring foreign skilled workers and specialists into Thailand to work there.
(4) Exempted from customs duty on imported machines and equipment.
(5) Within the normal period of income tax free or within 5 years since profit-making year, can be exempted additionally 50% of company income tax.
(6) Allow the companies to deduct twice of transportation cost as well as water and electricity expenses from income tax for 10 years.
(7) Allow the companies to deduct 25% of infrastructure construction and installation costs from net income.
4.4.3 Electronic and electric appliance industry development in Thailand
The development of electronic and electric appliance industry in Thailand benefits from the pouring in large quantity of foreign investment. Due to the stable politics, fine infrastructure and low labor cost, foreign companies make investments and build up factories in Thailand one after another. They take Thailand as their production basis, and the products are mainly for export.
From 1962 to 1995, there were altogether 163 electric appliance companies invested in Thailand with the total investment of US$ 1.8 billion, among which, 52% were joint ventures and 35% were sole foreign-funded enterprises. The investors were mainly Japanese, who occupied half of the total investment. 1987~1991 were the peak time of investment in Thailand, during which 72 companies built up factories in Thailand and 58% of them were Japanese-owned enterprises. Up to now, every main electric appliance company in Japan and Korea such as Sonly, Panasonic, NEC, Toshiba, Samsung, has built up at least one factory in Thailand. In addition Philips also made investment in Thailand. The electric appliances include television, electric fan, air conditioner, refrigerator, microwave oven and video recorder.
The high-tech enterprise of the USA and EU also joined in the ranks of making investment and establishing factory in Thailand. Lucent Technology Corp. and Philips produce integrated circuits, and Texas Instrument Corp. produces chips. Seagate Technology Corp. with its headquarters in the USA has invested and established 4 factories in Thailand to produce computer disk drivers.
The entering of foreign capitals has promoted the development of local enterprises. At present, Thai KCE Electronic Corp. is a main manufacture for producing printed circuit board in Thailand. Delta Electronic Corp. and Hana Micro-Electronic Corp. assemble integrated circuits and the products are exported to the USA. Hana Micro-Electronic Corp. has become a supplier of Motorola and Siemens.
The electronic and electric appliance industry in Thailand is an export orientation enterprise, and is the main industry export goods to earn foreign currency in Thailand. In 2000, the export value of electronic products was US$ 18.079 billion, an increase of 20.5% over the preceding year; and the export value of electric appliances was US$ 7.959 billion, and increase of 30.6 over the same period of the preceding year. Please refer to the Table below.

4.4.4 Status of electronic product output value in Thailand
In 1998, the output value of Thailand electronic products was US$ 14.577 billion, 0.5% lower than that in 1997. Among that, the first place was electronic data processing products with the output value of US$ 7.448 billion, which occupied 51.4% of gross output value; the second was electronic element with the output value of US$ 3.772 billon, 25.9% of gross output value; the third was consumption electronic products with the output value of US$ 1.926 billion, 13.2% of gross output value.
In 1999, the output value of Thailand electronic products was US$ 15.464 billion, 6.1% higher than that in 1998. Among that, the first place was electronic data processing products with the output value of US$ 7.937 billion, which was 6.0% higher than that in 1998 and occupied 51.3% of gross output value; the second was electronic element with the output value of US$ 4.072 billion, 8.0% higher than that in 1998 and 26.3% of gross output value; the third was consumption electronic products with the output value of US$ 1.999 billion, 3.8% higher than that in 1998 and 12.9% of gross output value.
4.4.5 Status of electronic product foreign trade between China and Thailand
The bilateral trade between China and Thailand reflects the complementarity of electronic and electric appliance industries. As for the statistics of Thailand Ministry of Commerce, among the top 15 products in bilateral trade, many items are electronic and electric products.
In 2000, Thailand exported to China automatic data processing machine and its components of US$ 436 million, an increase of 26.71% over the preceding year and occupied 15.38% of the gross export value; electronic integrated circuit of US$ 154 million, an increase of 420.20% and occupied 5.44% of the gross export value; as well as tricolor tube of US$ 84 million, an increase of 179.40% and occupied 2.96% of the gross export value.
In 2000, Thailand imported from China computer components and accessories of US$ 552 million, an increase of 26% and occupied 16.24% of the gross import value; household electric appliances of US$ 148 million, an increase of 42% and occupied 4.38% of the gross import value; as well as electronic integrated circuit of US$ 107 million, accounting for 3.17%.
The above data indicates that the electronic and electric appliances play an important role in the bilateral trade between China and Thailand. Along with the development of electronic and electric appliance industries in both countries, it is certain that the trade between two countries in this field will have a broader future.

4.5 Analysis of IT Application in Thailand
4.5.1 Responsibility Organ of IT in Thailand
Thailand's National Information Technology Committee (NITC) was founded in 1987, the present chairman is held by Thai Prime Minister, to pay attention to IT development. It is mainly responsible for IT development and application policies in Thailand, such as Y2K, software industry park, education Internet, government official's network training, etc. Currently it has 18 subcommittees, and 8 subcommittees are directly related to e-Commerce. They are one Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) subcommittee (now has already separated from NITC), six IT Act subcommittees, as well as one e-Commerce special work subcommittee.
Thailand National Electronic and Computer Technology Center (NECTEC) was founded in 1992, mainly responsible for the research work in electronic field and those fields related to computer. NECTEC has 15 research sections, dedicatedly engaged in the technical study of microelectronics, telecommunication, software and computer language. In the aspect of e-Commerce, NECTEC is responsible for the drafting of Thailand's e-Commerce information resources and center of e-Commerce manpower resource development projects. In 1992, Thailand Government designated that in addition to the main function of research and development, NECTEC is also the Secretariat office for Thailand's National Information Technology Committee.
In 1998, to promote the development of Thailand's e-Commerce and make it more competitive internationally, Thai Cabinet approved to found E-Commerce Resource Center (ECRC), under the leadership of NNECTEC. The main responsibilities of ECRC are: make the public understand and know more about e-Commerce, create the cooperation between state-owned and private department, and initiate new form of commerce; collect and share common information resources, trace the development of governmental and nongovernmental e-Commerce; set up manpower resource training projects, and enhance the capability of using e-Commerce for personnel from different fields; as well as responsible for the liaison with APEC e-Commerce Training Center, etc.

4.5.2 Developing e-Commerce Frame in Thailand
In 2000, e-Commerce Special Work Subcommittee of NITC entrusted ECRC to formulate the development frame of e-Commerce in Thailand. There are mainly 5 points:
(1) Pay attention to e-Commerce development, regard it as the national trade strategy of Thailand, and put it into the ninth (2002-2006) and tenth social-economic development plans.
(2) The Government supports and implements those measures assisting the private and consumer in using e-Commerce, so as to strengthen the competitiveness in the world and establish the confidence of practitioners and consumers. In both national and international aspects, The Government pays attention to set up the law frame and security mechanism for e-Commerce, and provide duly sufficient resources.
(3) The Government will abolish any regulation that hinders the development of e-Commerce. At the same time, it will monitor fair competition and protect consumers.
(4) The Government will reform the organizational structure towards e-Government; use electronic network to make governmental work more effective; as well as set up market of fair e-Commerce for the private.
(5) The Government will work together with the private, to establish information system as well as study and work out the development trend of e-Commerce, so as to make Thailand occupy a certain place in regional and international arenas.
4.5.3 E-Commerce development in Thailand
Along with the development of IT and popularization of Internet, e-Commerce, as an up-to-date means of transaction, is gradually penetrating into every industry or trade in Thailand, and becomes an important motive force of Thailand's economic recovery. As for the statistics of Thailand's Ministry of Commerce, as early as 1998, the transaction volume of Thailand's e-Commerce already reached to B 22 billion (equal to about US$ 580 million). In 2000, the transaction volume of Thailand's e-Commerce increased to B25 billion (equal to about US$ 660 million).
As early as 1998, Thailand's Ministry of Commerce began to promote the development of e-Commerce. The Ministry of Commerce firstly established several network stations, and provided them to Thailand's exporters free of charge, especially to small and medium enterprises for exhibiting their commodities and establishing relations with foreign clients. With the participation of Government, the credit degree of foreign clients to Thailand's enterprises was increased greatly. Many small and medium enterprises not only survived in financial crisis, but also developed and strengthened themselves.
However at present, there are still many obstacles for e-Commerce development in Thailand, and the biggest is the expensive fee for accessing to the network. Due to the monopolization of telecommunication industry, the fee for leasing network access line in Thailand is 5 times of that in Hong Kong, 4 times of that in Japan, 3 times of that in Singapore, and 2 times of that in Malaysia. The expensive network access fee makes many small and medium enterprises shrink back at the sight of e-Commerce. However, Thailand Government has already realized this issue and about to solve it.
Thailand Government also plans to promote the further development of e-Commerce through the measures of reforming tax policy, enhancing network safety, training relevant talents, and provided information service, etc. Thai private sector are also very active in developing e-Commerce. The e-Commerce scope of private enterprises has developed from single selling in the past to auctioning and providing business services, etc.