



Investment in Thailand remains buoyant. During the first nine months of 2025 (January–September), applications for investment promotion for over 2,622 projects, valued at 1.37 trillion baht, were received, a 94% increase compared to the same period last year. This reflects foreign investor confidence in Thailand's continued strong long-term production base in ASEAN.

The prolonged tensions along the Thai-Cambodian border have impacted the supply chains of Japanese investors, particularly in the parts and electronics industries.

Since the beginning of 2025, the baht has strengthened by more than 7%, while competitors such as Vietnam, India, and Malaysia have weakened their currencies against the US dollar. This has resulted in Thailand's main export products, including rice, cassava, and rubber, experiencing costs rising by more than 10%, immediately reducing their competitiveness.

The Chinese toy market was valued at approximately US$22.8 billion (around 165 billion yuan) in 2024 and is expected to reach US$50.6 billion by 2033, growing at an average annual growth rate of 8.6%, reflecting the continued expansion of demand for toys, particularly imported and premium products.

Thailand-Cambodia border trade in July 2025 plummeted by nearly 100%, shrinking by 97.5%, resulting in a more than 20% decrease in overall border trade, to just 66.22 billion baht.

Thailand and China have reached a significant agreement to expand the number of fresh fruit import and export border checkpoints by five, under the third-country transit cooperation framework, which will be effective from September 1, 2025.

The latest estimates suggest the Thai economy is expected to expand by 2.2% per year in 2025, up from the previous 2.1% forecast and in line with international organizations' upward revisions to 2% from 1.8%, while the global economy is expected to grow by 3% overall.

In an effort to balance international trade, Thailand has decided to allow U.S. soybeans to enter the market tariff-free. However, this tariff reduction doesn't just affect foreign producers…

The opening of some agricultural products in exchange for lower import tariffs for some industries is an issue that Thai businesses and farmers are closely watching, especially pork and offal, which are considered as one of the important products affecting the entire supply chain.

The Industrial Production Index (MPI) in May 2025 was 100.79, an increase of 1.88% compared to the same period of the previous year, expanding for the second consecutive month, with the capacity utilization rate (Cap U) increasing to 61.14% from 56.62% in April, reflecting the recovery of the manufacturing sector.