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สื่อ Time ลงข่าวใหญ่ นายกรัฐมนตรีของไทย ชักชวนนักลงทุนสหรัฐ ลงทุน โครงการโครงสร้างพื้นฐาน Landbridge มูลค่า 28 พันล้านเหรียญสหรัฐ ที่น่าสนใจอย่างยิ่ง
Thailand Pitches New Investors in U.S. on Old Idea of Southeast Asia Shipping Route Shortcut
BY KOH EWE
NOVEMBER 14, 2023
TIME
Since attaining the premiership in August, Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin has branded himself the nation’s chief “salesman,” traveling around the world to court foreign investments to boost Thailand’s stagnant economy. This week, as global leaders descend on San Francisco for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, he’s bringing perhaps his biggest pitch yet to a new crowd of potential investors: Landbridge, a $28 billion infrastructure project that offers an alternative trade route through Southeast Asia that would bypass one of the world’s busiest sea lanes.
The proposed 100-kilometer bridge that would cut across the Kra Isthmus, the narrowest part of the Malay Peninsula, would connect the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean without requiring ships to sail down along the tip of Singapore through the narrow Malacca Strait, which is known to experience congestion, collisions, and even piracy. The Landbridge is estimated by Thai authorities to cut transport duration by an average of four days and lower shipping costs by 15%.
The idea of creating an alternative route to the crowded Malacca Strait may be ambitious, but it’s not at all new: plans for such a shortcut, whether by land bridge or canal, date at least to the 17th century, in the Ayutthaya kingdom predating modern Thailand. More recently, similar ideas were also toyed with by Srettha’s predecessors—including the administrations of Prayut Chan-o-cha and Thaksin Shinawatra—but were repeatedly shelved due to concerns about the projects’ impacts on wildlife and local communities.
The Landbridge project also holds the potential to become a geopolitical flashpoint as competing powers vie for influence in the region, though Srettha appears keen to sidestep such tensions by welcoming any and all investors. While the Thaksin administration’s proposal to build a canal across the Kra Isthmus in the early 2000s reportedly attracted investment interest from several East Asian countries, including China, Srettha has now gone further than his predecessors by also looking to the West to secure funding for the project.
Srettha previously pitched the Landbridge to Chinese Premier Li Qiang and Chinese investors in October during the Belt and Road Forum in Beijing, where Chinese investors as well as investors from Saudi Arabia reportedly showed interest. In San Francisco this week, at his “Thailand Landbridge Roadshow,” Srettha stressed to U.S. investors how the proposed project, which Thailand aims to complete by 2039, would maintain the flow of goods as the capacity of the Malacca Strait faces increasing pressure.
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Indo-Pacific News - Geo-Politics & Defense News @IndoPac_Info
#Thailand Takes $28 Billion Malacca Strait Bypass Plan to #US - Bloomberg
Project seen cutting shipping time by four days, costs by 15%
Thai Premier Srettha urges US investors to join Landbridge project.
Thailand is pitching a multibillion-dollar project that will significantly cut shipping times between the Indian and Pacific oceans by bypassing the Malacca Strait — one of the world’s busiest sea lanes.
The land bridge project is expected to cost about 1 trillion baht, with seaports to be built in Ranong on the Andaman Sea and Chumphon on the Gulf of Thailand and linked by road-rail and pipeline network....
Previous proposals have failed to catch on, with opposition from communities and environmentalists a key obstacle.
The Strait of Malacca — a narrow sea lane between Malaysia and Singapore — is the shortest sea route linking the Asia-Pacific region to India and the Middle East. About a quarter of the world’s traded goods pass through the strait and it will only become busier, pushing up shipping costs, Mr Srettha said, noting that there are more than 60 maritime accidents a year on average in the passage.
“The land bridge will be an additional important route to support transport and an important option for resolving the problems of the Malacca Strait,” he said. “This will be a cheaper, faster and safer route.”
The port in Ranong would have capacity to handle 19.4 million 20-foot containers, and the one in Chumphon is designed for 13.8 million containers, together accounting for about 23% of the Port of Malacca’s total cargo, he said.
The prime minister said the project, which he has also pitched to investors in China and Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, will help create 280,000 jobs and propel the country’s annual economic growth rate to 5.5% when fully implemented.
The land bridge “presents an unprecedented opportunity to invest in this commercially and strategically important project that connects the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean, connecting people in the East with the West”, he said.
