If English fails, perhaps Mandarin will succeed – as the Ministry of Education has also been in discussions with China about creating a similar "Speaking Chinese Year Project", Sasithara said.
"Chinese officials were very interested in the English programme and offered to create a Chinese version – where they would send over 1,000 Chinese teachers to Thailand and provide scholarships to 1,000 Thai students to study in China," said Sasithara. "I told them, 'Yes, why not?' If we can learn both, it would be a great success."