The unbalanced growth industrialization strategy of land-abundance until the
1970s and labour abundance until the late 1980s, paradoxically, had been emphasizing the
development of industries involving the use of scarce ‘capital’. This raises the question; why
was the case and how did it come about?17 Moreover, import-substitution strategy even failed
to create forward and backward linkages in industrial sectors. Capital intensive
industrialization is meant to use more machinery but whether it will raise labour productivity
or not is inconclusive. However, Siamwalla and Setboonsarng (1989) comment on the role of
BOI in promoting industrial firms as follows