Industry wants to be among world's top five exporters.
The Food Processing Industry Club aims to make Thailand the export centre of Southeast Asia's food-processing industry in order to gain the highest benefit from the launch of the Asean Economic Community (AEC) in 2015, and ultimately to join the world's top-five food exporters within 10 years.
Under the Federation of Thai Industries, the club is coordinating with the Thai Trade Representative (TTR) to encourage Thailand's neighbouring countries, particularly Laos, Burma and Cambodia, to grow agricultural products used as |raw materials in Thailand's food-processing industry, club chairman Visit Limprana said last week. The main targets are crops that are more expensive and labour-intensive to grow in Thailand, such as rice, tapioca and certain fruits and vegetables.
Thailand has offered to help these underdeveloped countries improve productivity, framing the proposal as a win-win solution that will see them earn while helping Thailand, Asean's largest food exporter, increase export volumes.
The goal is to lower the Thai processing industry's costs, thereby boosting its competitiveness in preparation for the AEC.
Laos currently has good relations with Thailand, while Burma is opening up more to the trade. Vietnam also has good potential as a source of agricultural products, but FTI has not paid as much attention to the country as it is also developing its food-processing industry.
"Thailand last year was ranked the second-biggest food exporter in Asia, behind China. Last year, Thailand's food export value was Bt780 billion.
"If we can achieve average growth of 10 per cent a year, the value will reach Bt1 trillion by 2012.
"Food-processing is our strength. We can be among the top-five global food exporters within 10 years if we do as planned," Visit said.
He said the Food Processing Industry Club is encouraging food-processing manufacturers to establish plants near the neighbouring countries' borders to reduce transportation costs. Some of them have already done so.
"Thailand's situation regarding transportation is perfect. We have a transportation route through the east-west corridor and can distribute food products to southern China from the North and Northeast of our country. So, there is potential to increase the volume
of our food-processing products in the near future," he said.
If the food-processing industry implements this plan, Visit said, Thailand could also create food security for other countries such as those in the Middle East, which do not have much land on which to grow agricultural products.
He urged the government to help open new export markets for the Thai food industry, and recommended financial authorities strive to maintain a stable exchange rate for the baht, pointing out that every percentage point change in the currency's value means a difference of millions of baht in terms of food exporters' income.
Visit expected the value of Thai food exports this year to grow by 10-14 per cent from Bt780 billion in 2009.