The New Economy Academy (NEA), which is tasked with upgrading small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and teaching them e-commerce methods, aims to help at least 250,000 entrepreneurs through 130 training projects in 2019, in part to improve Thai competitiveness.
Banjongjitt Angsusingh, director-general of the International Trade Promotion Department, said the NEA provided training this year to more than 204,000 entrepreneurs.
Ms Banjongjitt said the academy will focus next year more on developing business owners in provincial areas, hoping to develop new exporters, which are good for the country's economy.
The NEA was founded early last year with the aim of being a centre to develop entrepreneurs at all levels nationwide to be prepared for doing business in the new economy, with increased emphasis on technology, digitalisation, and creativity.
The academy's goal is to encourage entrepreneurs to apply IT and digital technology to their businesses, as well as expand their distribution channels. The NEA aims to develop capabilities by enhancing knowledge in trade and business-related fields, and disseminate knowledge on business operations in the new economy to entrepreneurs, particularly SMEs.
The academy offers training courses covering not only e-commerce but also online marketing, trading via social media and logistics management, functioning largely as an incubation centre to develop young entrepreneurs.
NEA courses will be available at the learner's convenience through e-learning and other digital instruments.
Learning centres are being expanded into provincial areas, mainly at the Commerce Ministry's provincial offices, the community digital centres of the Digital Economy and Society Ministry, educational institutes, branches of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, and the Federation of Thai Industries.
The academy was inspired by Alibaba Group's Rural Taobao programme, initiated to help raise living standards in China's countryside by providing e-commerce access to millions of the country's poorer citizens.
More than 16,000 Taobao Rural Service centres are already in place and over the next 3-5 years, Alibaba plans to expand the programme to 100,000 villages and 1,000 rural counties, enough to cover one-sixth of all Chinese villages and one-third of all counties.
The Commerce Ministry's Business Development Department projected new business registrations in 2018 will increase by more than 7% from 2017, citing government investment in both infrastructure and the Eastern Economic Corridor as stimuli for private investment.
In the first nine months, the department reported new business registrations totalled 56,271, up 1% from the same period last year, with a combined registered capital of 240 billion baht, down 9%.
The number of new businesses registered with the Commerce Ministry hit a five-year high of 74,500 in 2017, up 16% from 64,200 in 2016, driven by the recovering economy, growing tourism and the state welfare scheme.
The government's tax incentives to support individual entrepreneurs, especially for gold trading, drug stores and real estate, in establishing businesses through juristic persons also played a vital part in driving registration last year.