Thailand's tourism hard hit by COVID-19 (Source: VNA) Bangkok (VNA) – The Thai economy is forecast to experience a U-shaped economic recovery and a return to pre-pandemic growth levels in two years.
Yunyong Thaicharoen, chief economist of the Siam Commercial Bank's Economic Intelligence Centre (EIC), said that the country’s GDP growth will show pre-coronavirus levels by early 2022.
The worst contraction is expected to be seen this quarter at 12.1 percent, before narrowing to 9.2 percent in the third quarter and 6.7 percent in the fourth, he said.
The EIC lowered its economic growth forecast for 2020 to a 7.3 percent contraction from a 5.6 percent fall predicted earlier, assuming that the number of foreign tourist arrivals will plunge 75.3 percent from last year to 9.8 million.
Thailand’s conomic growth shrank 1.8 percent year-on-year in the first quarter, the deepest contraction since the flood-hit fourth quarter of 2011./.
VNA
