The new economic team will propose several packages to assist small and medium enterprises to the cabinet meeting for approval today.
Newly-appointed deputy prime minister in charge of economic affairs Somkid Jatusripitak, head of the new economic team, revealed the assistance packages after a meeting with economic ministers yesterday.
Somkid said the measures consist of two phases.
The first phase measure aims to boost liquidity of SMEs.
Under this phase, public banks including Krung Thai Bank and the Government Saving Bank, will be convinced to lend more money to SMEs and government agencies will be guarantors for the loans.
He said this will also involve tax reduction to help SMEs cut operational costs.
The second phase aims to foster strength of SMEs, he said and noted that the Commerce Ministry and the Industry Ministry have been instructed to explore new online or e-commerce markets for SMEs.
The deputy prime minister stressed that the measures will not affect the government’s revenue collection.
At the same time, Finance Minister Apisak Tantiworawong revealed that the ministry plans to reduce tax to assist SMEs in important sectors.
This is aimed to enable SMEs to continue their business in future, he said, but declined to say the amount of budget to help the SMEs under this measure.