October 1, 2008
Bangkok - Thailand faced current and trade account defecit in August because of exports slowdown, especially in the rice market, according to the Bank of Thailand (BoT).
The current account deficit reached 853 million dollars last month, according to BoT’s montly report.
Thailand recorded 502 million dollars of current account surplus last year.
Export growth decreased to 15.5% year-on-year, 43.9% drop from the previous month. The trade deficit was 675 million dollars.
Exports mostly slowed down in terms of volume while rice exports went down in terms of value and volume, according to BoT official Titanun Mallikamas.
Rubber exports also declined in August.
Exports totally valued more than 15 billion dollars in August whereas imports valued 16.46 billion dollars, 26.9% increase year-on-year.
Exports to the United States went up 6.54% year-on-year to 1.79 billion dollars while exports to Japan hiked 23.37% to 1.90 billion dollars.
EU-bound exports also grew 6.21 percent to 2.05 billion dollars.
