A new 18-member of the Board of Investment has been appointed by an order of the National Council for Peace and Order with General Prayuth Chan-ocha sitting in the board as the chairman
The other members of the board are ACM Prajin Jantong, air force commander-in-chief and advisory board of NCPO;
General Chatchai Sarikalya, deputy chief of the advisory board; industry permanent secretary Vitoon Simachokedee; finance permanent secretary Rangsan Sriworasart; commerce permanent secretary Mrs Srirat Ratthapana; National Economic and Social Development secretary-general Arkhom Termpittayapaisit.
Issara Wongkusolkit,president of Board of Trade; Suphan Mongkolsuthee, president of Federation of Thai Industries; Boonthak Wangcharoen, president of Thai Bankers Association;
Prasarn Trairatvorakul, governor of Bank of Thailand; Sathit Limpongphan; Thewin Wongwanich, president of Thai Business Management Association; Mrs Pentip Pornchaded, president of SMEs Promotion Association; Somchai Harnhirun, director of Office of Industrial Economics; Prakit Chin-amornpong, president of Thai Hotels Association; Pakkapol Ngamlak, presidents of Retailers Association; and Udom Wongwiwatchai, secretary-general of Board of Investment.
A 42% decrease in project applications
During the first four months this year (January – April 2014), the BOI received applications for 399 projects with a combined investment value of 270,000 million baht. In 2013, however, there were 692 projects applying for investment promotional incentives with the total investment value of 488,900 million baht during the same period.
This represented a 42% decrease in the number of projects and a 44.8% decrease in terms of investment value. The main reason for the decrease is that in the first four months of 2013 there were more than 10 large-scale projects applying for promotion incentives, boosting the total investment value to over 158,000 million baht.
These large-scale projects included Thai Airways International’s air transportation services project, and the Thai AirAsia, Nok Air. Moreover, there were Honda car manufacturing projects, which had total investment value of more than 33,200 million baht, and also maritime transportation services projects with an investment value of more than 20,000 million baht.