Experts are predicting that Thailand’s economy will contract by 8.9 percent this year even though the country has lifted the restrictions introduced earlier to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus, the media reported.
Amonthep Chawla, Head of the Research Office at CIMB THAI Bank said that Thailand’s economy was still far from showing signs of recovery even though the country was heading towards the fourth phase of lockdown easing.
“Productivity, confidence, and consumer spending will remain low in the period ahead”, he told the media.
According to him, Thailand will see the economic implications of the lockdown measures introduced to fight the coronavirus in the second half of this year.
“Key factors for the Thai economy were the risk of a second wave of coronavirus infection and oil price,” he added.
The World Bank also predicts that the global economy will shrink by 5.2 percent this year due to the pandemic.
Economic activities in advanced economies are forecasted to contract by 7 percent this year as domestic demand and supply, trade, and finance have been severely disrupted due to the lockdown measures introduced to curb the spread of the Covid-19 virus.
Growth in East Asia and Pacific is projected to fall to 0.5 percent in 2020, the only region that could see growth this year, the World Bank report said. The Chinese economy is expected to grow by 1 percent this year.
The outlook for global economy is “highly uncertain and downside risks are predominant,” including the possibility of a more protracted pandemic, financial upheaval, and retreat from global trade and supply linkages.