Most executives under the Federation of Thai Industries (FTI) believe the economy during the second half will not improve much, with GDP growth likely to be less than 2% for the whole year, despite the state's efforts to speed up budget spending, according the latest FTI survey.
"Up to 39.3% of 143 executives interviewed believe business performance and sales will remain unchanged in the second half of 2024," said ML Peekthong Thongyai, vice-chairman of the FTI.
They were among executives from provincial FTI branches and company executives across 46 industries.
Up to 32.2% said business health would get worse in the remaining months of this year while 28% believe it will recover, said ML Peekthong.
Their responses reflected disappointment with companies' sales in the first half of the year, compared with the same period in 2023.
The majority of interviewees (30.8%) said their sales were no different from those recorded during the corresponding period last year while 23.8% said their sales had decreased by 1-10%.
Some 19.6% said their sales had decreased by more than 10%, said ML Peekthong.
Only 21% of respondents experienced an increase in sales by 1-10% while just 4.9% of executives saw their sales grow by more than 10%.
Up to 51.7% of the interviewees believed the economy will not grow by more than 2% in 2024.
Some 39.9% of respondents said economic growth should stand at 2-3% while 5.6% were more positive with a projection of 3-4% growth.
Only 2.8% of respondents still believed economic activities would significantly improve in the second half, increasing GDP growth for the entire year to more than 4%.