The Kingdom of Thailand, covering an area of 514,000 square kilometers, lies in the heart of Southeast Asia, roughly equidistant between India and China. It shares borders with Myanmar to the west and north, Lao P.D.R. to the north and northeast, Cambodia to the east and Malaysia to the south.

The country has a population of about 60 million, almost 94% of which are literate. Ethnic Thais form the majority, though the area has historically been a migratory crossroads, and thus strains of Mon, Khmer, Burmese, Lao, Malay, Indian and most strongly, Chinese stock produce a degree of ethnic diversity. The official language is Thai although English is widely spoken.

After enjoying the world's highest growth rate from 1985 to 1995 - averaging almost 9% annually - increased speculative pressure on Thailand's currency in 1997 led to a crisis that uncovered financial sector weaknesses and forced the government to float the baht. Long pegged at 25 to the dollar, the baht reached its lowest point of 56 to the dollar in January 1998 and the economy contracted by 10.2% that same year. Thailand entered a recovery stage in 1999, expanding 4.2% and grew about the same amount in 2000, largely due to strong exports - which increased about 20% in 2000. An ailing financial sector and the slow pace of corporate debt restructuring, combined with a softening of global demand, is likely to slow growth in 2001.

From a relatively stable political environment, progress has emerged in Thailand, and has given rise to significant but uneven social development. Thailand faces the task of sustaining the development achieved and having a greater distribution of its benefits. 

Areas of focus for development include economic decentralization and rural development to provide equitable access for poor men and women to employment opportunities, goods and services; human resource development and labor force adjustment; technology development; improved health and welfare services; development of infrastructure; and environmental concerns. 

The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), a major development partner of Thailand since 1981, recognizes that Thailand has reduced its absolute poverty from over 57% (1960s) to about 20% (1999), but national wealth and social development are not evenly distributed with still about 12 million, mostly rural people, remaining poor. Thus, there is a widening of the income gap between rich and poor in the country. About 80% of the work force has only primary education and over 60% of workers are still in agriculture, despite its declining share of GDP. Few social safety nets are in place. 

From capital assistance, Thailand 's donors have been shifting to physical infrastructure to technical assistance for social infrastructure and the environment. Japan has been providing some US $415 million a year in ODA to Thailand and is making this shift while maintaining ODA levels. The World Bank is also re-focusing on policy and technical advice for energy and transportation and on human resource development, poverty and the environment, and is increasing assistance from $180 million a year in 1991-93 to $300 million a year for 1994-97. Social infrastructure is also more predominant in the Asian Development Bank's program. The Bank is decreasing lending from $430 million a year in 1992-93 to $250 million a year in 1994-97. UN organizations and bilateral donors also recognize the value to Thailand of technical expertise rather than capital funding at this stage of its development.

The present prime minister of Thailand is computer business magnate, Dr. Thaksin Shinawatra.

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Links to Thailand

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Women in politics, governance and decision-making
While there are no legal restrictions on their political participation, the percentage of women in government or politics does not reflect accurately their numbers in the population, especially at senior levels in the national government. There are 48 women among the 500 members of the House of Representatives, and 20 women in the 200-member Senate.

Of the Parliament elected in 1996, there were 22 women among the 393 members of the House of Representatives. On average less than 10 percent of Parliament members have been women; however, this figure has risen steadily. 

There are 3 women on the 36-member Cabinet. On average approximately 5 percent of Cabinet members in recent years have been women. Although over half of civil service employees are women, few hold senior positions.

In local government, substantial changes occurred after 1982, when the Local Administration Act allowed women to take up the post of village head and sub-district head. Although the proportion of female village heads in 1996 was only 1.6 percent it had risen from 0.7 percent in 1986. The 98.4 percent of male incumbents who were elected before 1992 (ten years or more since the Act came into being), will remain in their position until the retirement age of 60 years, thus progress toward greater gender equity will be slow.

Participation of women in village councils is low because public representation is perceived to be a masculine domain, and because business meetings are often held outside the village and late into the night, making it more difficult for women to attend. Since important economic decisions are made by the council, such as the location of a new well or the selection of representatives from the village to take part in training programs on new farming technology, women’s interests are adversely affected by their low representation.

There are several other structural and cultural barriers to women’s participation in local government. The previous exclusion of women reinforced the idea that local government was appropriate only for men. There is a cultural preference for men to hold positions of power that entail decision-making, and women tend to be excluded from the political and patronage networks that dominate public life at all levels in Thailand. Other factors include the lower education levels among women in the past, and the greater demands of household management placed on women, especially those in low-income rural households.2 However, women are becoming increasingly active in “grassroots” political movements, such as the Assemblies of the Poor, and small popular movements seeking to gain legal recognition of their land-ownership rights in the Northeast.

In 1994, another door was opened for women’s participation in local administration with the passing of the Sub-district Council and Sub-district Administrative Organization Act, under a decentralization policy (one sub-district consists of about eight villages). Elected officials will gradually replace appointed ones, who are almost all male. Government agencies on the development of women and women’s NGOs have been campaigning for and training women to run in these elections. Female candidates now represent on average 10 percent. In the last election, they represented 0.8 percent of those elected.

The Constitution includes an article that specifies that one-third of the members of the new National Human Rights Commission be women. The Women and Constitution Network, a league of 35 women's organizations, advocates for legal reforms to address legal inequities in the treatment of women. It continues to play an important role in securing the inclusion of gender equality clauses in legislation that create new government organizations mandated by the 1997 Constitution.

The Constitution has six gender-related articles designed to provide women with equal rights and protections, but some inequalities in the law remain. 

Women have equal access to higher education, and more than half of university graduates each year are women. However, police and military academies (except for the nursing academy) do not accept female students, although a significant number of instructors at the military academies are women. 

Thai women make up 47% of the formal work force, the highest in the Asia-Pacific region. They are in agricultural, trade, service and manufacturing jobs, and shifting from agricultural to urban employment. They hold an increasing share of professional positions. Women are able to own and manage businesses freely. But whether women are owners or workers in all sizes of business, few are still are in decision-making positions, facing persistent cultural, attitudinal and legal barriers.

Although government regulations require employers to pay equal wages and benefits for equal work regardless of gender there is a significant gap between the average salaries earned by men and women because women are concentrated in lower-paying jobs.  In practice women also receive lower pay for equal work in virtually all sectors of the economy. Discrimination in hiring is also common. However, improved media coverage and public awareness of women's issues has improved, and a permanent National Commission for Women's Affairs has been formed.

You may download a full report on the situation of women in Thailand.

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Important political facts

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