Thailand adds supportive measures as new coronavirus outbreak hits economy

2021-05-06 09:36:12 GMT2021-05-06 17:36:12(Beijing Time) Xinhua English

BANGKOK, May 6 (Xinhua) -- Thailand is planning to spend billions of U.S. dollars in economic relief to help people affected by COVID-19 and support its economic recovery threatened by a new wave of pandemic.

The cabinet of ministers has approved a package of supportive measures with an estimated cost of 178.5 billion baht (about 5.7 billion U.S. dollars), including the extension of a co-payment campaign, according to Deputy Prime Minister Supattanapong Punmeechaow.

The government will launch the phase-three of the co-payment campaign, likely to benefit 31 million people from July to December, Supattanapong said at an online press conference.

The program allows registered individuals to buy goods or services by paying only half the price of their purchases, with the government subsidizing the other half, a maximum of 3,000 baht in total in phase- three.

The government also approved grants for the "We Win" and "We Love Each Other" campaigns, with each person registered for the schemes able to receive a total of 2,000 baht before the end of June.

These measures came as Thailand continued to grapple with its worst coronavirus outbreak so far, which has claimed more than 200 lives in the past month and more than doubled the country's COVID-19 caseload to reach 76,811 Thursday.

The outbreak forced the government to reintroduce restrictive measures, including closing schools and entertainment venues, limiting business hours and increasing the mandatory quarantine period to two weeks, which had been reduced early last month to 10 days for international visitors from countries with no cases of COVID-19 variant strains.

The Bank of Thailand, the country's central bank, on Wednesday held its policy rate unchanged at a record low of 0.5 percent, the eighth straight hold, to support the economic recovery.

The economy would "expand at a much lower rate due to the third wave of the outbreak," the central bank said, adding that it would stand ready to use additional appropriate monetary policy tools if necessary. Enditem

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