Voicing concern about the country's economic prospects, businesses are urging the government to rev up budget disbursement and infrastructure development.
Supant Mongkolsuthee, chairman of the Federation of Thai Industries, said after yesterday's monthly meeting of the Joint Standing Committee on Commerce, Industry and Banking that the government's spending was too slow to stimulate the economy and consumption.
"We're now increasingly concerned about delays in government investment, particularly in infrastructure megaprojects," he said.
"Although state investment accounts for less than 20% of Thai gross domestic product, it can help stimulate domestic consumption as most people are tightening their belts due to lower income and high household debt."
According to a recent Budget Bureau report to the cabinet, as of Feb 13 just 1.01 trillion baht or 39% of the total 2.575-trillion-baht budget had been disbursed.
Of the investment budget, just 65.7 billion baht or 15% had been disbursed. The figures were much lower than the 41.8% demanded by the government.
Disbursement of the regular budget fared better, with 950 billion baht or 44.8% disbursed, outstripping the government's target of 43.99%.
All state agencies are now required by the government to improve their disbursement of investment budget to meet a target of 87% at the end of the fiscal year.
The government will use the efficiency of budget disbursement to evaluate the performance of each state agency head after the fiscal year ends on Sept 30.
The budget for fiscal 2015, which began last Oct 1, calls for public spending of 2.575 trillion baht, up 2% from the fiscal 2014 budget.
Of the total, 2.03 trillion baht or 78.8% is set aside for expenditure, 450 billion baht or 17.5% for investment and the rest for Treasury reserves and debt repayment.
According to Mr Supant, the joint standing committee is closely monitoring the government's budget disbursement and maintaining its full-year GDP growth forecast of 3.5%.
Only the tourism sector is likely to drive the economy, he said, with export growth projected to hit a ceiling of 2.5%, down from an earlier 3.5% forecast.
The economies of key trade partners such as Europe and Japan have yet to recover as expected, while the baht is relatively strong in comparison with other Asian currencies.
The Commerce Ministry reported that January exports contracted by 3.46% year-on-year to US$17.2 billion, the biggest fall since last August. In baht terms, exports slipped 2.34% to 563 billion baht.
The joint standing committee also asked the central bank to cut the policy interest rate by 50 basis points to 1.5% to stimulate the economy and slow the baht's appreciation.