Thailand's border trade with neighbouring countries is on track to more than quadruple to 2 trillion baht in three years but greater acceptance of Asean currencies for trading in addition to the US dollar is crucial, say businessmen.
Pairush Burapachaisri, vice-chairman of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, said language barriers and difficulties relating to financial transactions are among the obstacles hindering the potential of cross-border trade.
Mr Pairush recommended that Thai businesses should increase their willingness to accept Asean local currencies to boost border trade.
"When they [bordering countries] receive dollars, they can buy products of any country. If they have a lot of baht, they will definitely buy our products," said Mr Pairush, who is also chairman and chief executive of Pin Siam Co.
"Right now, countries that do border trade with us are more willing to accept local currency than we are. Thais should be more willing to accept and recognise local currencies instead of making it seem like we are looking down on them," he said.
Mr Pairush suggested that Thai currency exchange service providers such as Super Rich should be set up to deal exclusively with these currencies.
According to the Department of Foreign Trade's Bureau of Trade and Investment Cooperation, Thailand's border trade with Malaysia, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia reached 910.5 billion baht last year, up 2.23% from 890.7 billion in 2011. Of the total, exports contributed to 556.98 billion baht with imports accounting for the rest.
For the first six months of this year, border trade was nearly 457 billion baht, a 0.46% increase from the same period last year.
Trade with Malaysia contributed around 54%, followed by Myanmar (21%), Laos (15%) and Cambodia (10%).
Mr Pairush said border trade worth 2 trillion baht a year, as projected by the government, is likely to be achievable in the next three years.
Regarding border trade with Myanmar at Mae Sot-Myawaddy checkpoint, traders use both kyat or baht informally, said Kyaw Min, a border trader in Myanmar's Myawaddy, located opposite Tak's Mae Sot district.
"This is a common understanding between Thai and Myanmar traders from small to large amounts of trade, and we do it according to the current exchange rate.
"But the kyat cannot be exchanged at Thai banks on the border, so we are looking at the situation," he said.
But people in Tachilek, a border town in Myanmar, commonly trade in baht instead of kyat.
Nay Win, a manager at GL, the main filling station at Tachilek, said the station imports fuel from Thailand and sells in baht, as the kyat is useless in border trading there.
"Since using baht is common here, we are doing business smoothly with it," he said.
"But we have to calculate into kyat while we are sending money back to the main office in Yangon."