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Trairong Suwankhiri, 66, the newly appointed deputy prime minister in charge of economic affairs, is an economist by training.

He earned his bachelor's degree in economics from Thammasat University, and later master's as well as PhD in the same field from University of Hawaii.

A former economics lecturer, Trairong turned his attention to politics in 1979 when he ran for a Bangkok MP seat, but was defeated by former premier late Samak Sundaravej.

Two years later, when General Prem Tinsulanonda took over as prime minister, Trairong was named the government's chief spokesman.

Trairong's first election victory as MP came in 1986 when he represented his southern home province of Songkhla under the banner of the Democrat Party.

Previously, he had held the Industry (1994-1995) and Labour (1997-1998) portfolios as well as the chair of House of Representatives' subcommittee on macroeconomics.

An eight-time MP, Trairong said: "The global economy [which faced its worst recession in seven decades during 2008-09] would recover in the shape of a smoking-pipe [the recovery path would be longer than the recession itself]."

In his opinion, the global recovery is not going to be either V-shaped or U-shaped, meaning that it would be at least 2012 before global demand returned to solid growth.

At this stage, China, India and other Asian economies are leading the initial recovery, which should be followed in the next two or three years by recoveries in the US, the euro zone and Japan.

"As a student and lecturer of economics, I was quite familiar with the history of the 1930s Great Depression, which took place during the reign of King Rama VI.

"Back then, our country was also hit by a depression that lasted six to seven years and many civil servants lost their jobs due to the economic catastrophe. In the West, unemployment was as high as 20 to 30 per cent.

"At the start of this year, I was invited to attend a major seminar on economics held by the European Central Bank. My impression is that interest rates are unlikely to go up any time now.

"The rates should remain unchanged for at least another six months largely because unemployment in the euro zone of 27 economies remains very high - it's at a double-digit level.

"US unemployment is also at a record high of more than 10 per cent, so authorities need to ensure that growth is solid and can create new jobs before they can withdraw the current economic stimulus and tighten the monetary policy by raising interest rates.

"If stimulus packages were withdrawn prematurely, everyone would be hit, including Thailand, because we're not a large economy and we're dependent on exports to drive GDP growth.

"Besides the global economic outlook, I think the oil price up-trend could be another major concern and inflation could be the next worry [due to the massive liquidity being injected into the global economic system over the past one or two years]. I'm positive that our economy could grow by 3 to 3.5 per cent this year but it's time to focus on longer-term measures [so the country's international competitiveness can be increased]," said the former economics lecturer.