Thailand’s Leap to 26th Place to 48th Makes Way for Hassle-Free Thai Business Set-up

Setting up business in Thailand by foreign companies is going to be easier in the coming year. As you may know, the country has made a long jump to being the 26th in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business Rankings for 2018, the Thai government ensures tackling all the obstacles, says Prayut Chan-o-cha, the Prime Minister.

He added that greater confidence in the country could be seen as the economic growth prospects are expected after the country was recognized as one amongst the ten economies with the majority of the improvement. After Thailand has adopted almost eight reforms in the past few years, the country has been making impressive strides. While taking to improve the regulatory framework that was a barrier to doing business, the Thai government is also supporting the development of Doing Business portal to make sure that it provides easier and faster services for the business owners.

The World Bank’s director for Thailand and Malaysia said that Thailand has made huge progress in reforming the business ecosystem of the country over the past years. And this has been possible with strong government leadership at top levels. Ranking 26th, the country has topped leaving behind almost 15% of the globally recognized countries in the Ease of Doing Business, which is indeed a great achievement.

Several improvements have been made in the Ease of Doing Business; like, the government has eliminated the need to obtain a company’s seal or the requirement for approval of the company’s regulations from the Labour Department. Hence, the time taken to set up a business in Thailand has been lessened to 4.5 days from 27.5 days. Additionally, the governing body has implemented a risk-based system that intends to select companies for the tax audit, adopt legislation to widen the scope of assets, which of course can be used as collateral, and lessen the property transfer tax rate. Similarly, geographic information systems are being used to access electricity.

Such systematic reforms continue strengthening the business ecosystem while focusing on areas where there are rooms for improvements.