Finally, according to the Office of SME Promotion (OSMEP) from the Thai
Ministry of Industry, which produces the annual White Paper on Thailand SMEs,
the main problems faced by SMEs are comprised of the following: First, declining
competitiveness: since the Thai government is focused on a export-led growth
strategy, then the development direction of Thai SMEs is geared to compete in the
world market. Unfortunately, Thai SMEs have a number of problems. In terms of
production costs, especially labor costs, Thai SMEs cannot compete with competitors
that have lower labor costs such as China, Indonesia, and Vietnam. In terms of product
quality and technological advances, Thai SMEs cannot compete with the SMEs in
more developed economies such as Italy, Japan, and Taiwan. Thai SMEs are producing
by using labor-intensive and old-fashion technology in order to produce products at
the same quality as products from China and Vietnam with higher production costs.
Therefore, Thai SMEs are facing a problem of competitiveness in decline. Second,