The Commerce Ministry has teamed up with Bangkok Bank Plc and DHL Express International (Thailand) to boost exports from Thai small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) via its online marketplace.
Nuntawan Sakuntanaga, director-general of the International Trade Promotion Department, said authorities have high hopes the partnership will raise transaction values through Thaitrade.com.
Developed four years ago by the department, Thaitrade.com is Thailand's first official B2B e-marketplace. The website now features over 200,000 products and attracts 2.15 million foreign visitors from about 200 countries.
Last year, more than 7.5 billion baht worth of transactions took place on Thaitrade.com.
"This new partnership will help facilitate shipments and payments for traders and buyers, and build the confidence of potential buyers worldwide," said Ms Nuntawan. "It also aims to address the growing global online shopping trend and enable Thai entrepreneurs, particularly SMEs, to cope with Thailand's imminent digital economy."
She said the department aimed to raise the number of entrepreneur site members to 15,000 this year from 13,000.
Suteera Sripaibulya, senior executive vice-president of Bangkok Bank, said the bank expected to start providing e-banking services by October this year.
The bank will invest about 30 million baht to develop and install an escrow system to ensure security and safety to both buyers and sellers. The escrow system, in which buyers need not release payment until they have received and validated the merchandise, could encourage more people to use its services and overcome consumers' distrust of online commerce.
Ms Suteera said with 29 foreign branches in 14 key economic locations, as well as 1,100 partnership banks, Bangkok Bank was confident it could cater to a wide range of financial services customers, traders and trade partners.
Chananyarak Phetcharat, managing director of DHL Express International (Thailand), said under the partnership members buying on Thaitrade.com would receive a 30% discount for DHL's postal and logistics services, updated information on international logistics services and trade alerts on changing customs regulations.
The Bonn-based postal and logistics group also provides export-import information about each Asean market for online traders.