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SURF THE AEC
SURF THE AEC

Thailand and Alibaba Group

Partnered Up to Bolster Thailand 4.0

only accepts trustworthy products and credible traders. With this
Deputy Prime Minister Dr.Somkid Jatusripitak; agreement, benefits and advantages on Thailand’s part should far
China’s Ambassador to Thailand, Ambassador outshine the loss.
Lyu Jian; Mr.Jack Ma, the Executive Chairman of Upsides for Thailand— this initiative will help
the Alibaba Group; along with Thai government’s Thailand in:
economic team, recently witnessed the signing 1. Boosting up confidents among investors, both Thai and
of the Memorandum of Understanding or MOU foreigners, making EEC an attractive port of investment.
2. Facilitating the new start-ups and SMEs entrepreneurs in
between agencies of the Thai Government and developing new products and services for regional and international
affiliated companies of the Alibaba Group. This markets.
is envisioned as an effort to boost up investment 3. Establishing better, faster and more efficient cross-border
in the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) and transportation and logistics systems between Thai, China and other
to drive the development of Thailand’s digital neighboring countries, as well as setting up warehouse for storing
economy under the Thailand 4.0 policy. Multi- materials and merchandises before distributing to both domestic
and cross-border buyers.
tiered in nature, this partnership aims to bring all 4. Small and medium sized entrepreneurs and farmers are given
Thai SMEs into E-commerce market, to develop opportunity to participate in E-commerce and online-trade trainings
Thai digital talents, to upgrade Thai logistics to enhance their understanding and knowledge on the subject matter.
5. Introducing and promoting new travel destinations in exotic
with the help of Alibaba’s sophisticated logistics and less well-known parts of Thailand to the Chinese tourists who
technology, and to promote Thai tourism industry favor Thai food and Thai culture, as well as boosting revenues from
through digital channels. tourists’ spending.
6. Thai farmers will get better and fairer prices for their produces
without getting exploited by middlemen.
Analysis
Alibaba is a Chinese multinational web-based B2B (Business Downsides for Thailand:
to Business) conglomerate. It is one of the world’s largest retail and 1. Tidal waves of goods from China will come pouring in,
wholesale website that facilitates small and medium sized business competing with Thai goods.
ventures with fully-integrated E-commerce platform for around-the- 2. Thai manufactures will further loose edge in competing with
clock online trade without middlemen. China’s already much lower cost of production.
Presently, China’s population exceeds 1.3 billion and is becoming 3. Increasing unemployment from plants closing down.
the world’s biggest consumer market, with the buying power of 300 4. Thai wholesalers in many sectors, such as fruit wholesalers
million potential middleclass consumers. With this MOU endorsement will be badly affected or even gradually die out by this agreement
and partnership with Alibaba, Thailand has been presented with a with Alibaba. For instance, many fruit coops in the eastern part of
great opportunity in gaining access to a tremendous market and Thailand have now been stocking durians for Alibaba, which planned
massive buying power of the Chinese through Tmall.com, which is to take all stocks of Thai durians for the next three years.
China’s biggest B2C (Business to Consumer) online website that

80 FOOD FOCUS THAILAND JUN 2018
80 FOOD FOCUS THAILAND JUN 2018