BoI okays 26 EV manufacturing projects worth THB80bn so far: DES Ministry
Thailand’s electric vehicle manufacturing industry alone has attracted 80 billion baht worth of investment, the government said, rejecting rumours that no new foreign investment has come into the country recently.
Noppawan Huajaimun, the Digital Economy and Society (DES) Ministry’s spokesperson, said on Sunday that government opponents are sharing “fake news” that the state has failed to attract foreign investment over the past eight years.
She said new foreign investments had come to Thailand every year, and the Board of Investment (BoI) has been regularly offering new tax benefits to foreign investors.
She said the BoI has approved 26 EV manufacturing projects from 17 companies this year alone. The projects have a combined investment value of 80.21 billion baht, not including the value of the land and circulation of capital, she added.
Noppawan said the BoI has, so far, approved tax benefits for the production of 838,775 EVs and issued promotion certificates to 16 projects, including six for manufacturing sedans, two for pick-up trucks and three for motorcycles.
Apart from these projects, BoI has also approved supporting packages for three data-centre projects located in Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) industrial estates, Noppawan said.
Close to 25 billion baht will be invested in the three data centres, which will be built by Amazon Data Services (Thailand) Co Ltd.
The Digital Economy Promotion Agency (depa) is also cooperating with state and private agencies to develop 30 smart city projects in 23 provinces.
These include 15 new smart city projects in 14 projects that were approved on August 5 by a subcommittee chaired by DES Minister Chaiwut Thanakamanusorn, Noppawan said.
