Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, it would seem that the Thai Foreign Ministry is taking a proactive role in matters pertaining to economics, tourism, trade etc. We have seen this kind of manifest in recent days with regard to even meetings the Prime Minister has had with folks within the Foreign Ministry to sort of get some momentum I guess behind kind of a new program, a more proactive approach seems to be how they are sort of framing this with regard to changes from the Foreign Ministry. 

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Nation Thailand, that's nationthailand.com, the article is titled: Foreign Ministry urges envoys to become proactive in driving Thai economy. Quoting directly: "The Foreign Ministry launched a week-long summit with Thai Ambassadors, Consuls General and Trade Representatives to give them instructions on working proactively to expand the country's economy." Quoting further: "The forum, which wraps up on Friday, was opened by Foreign Minister Parnpree Bahiddha-Nukara on Monday at the JW Marriott Hotel Bangkok. Attending were 65 Ambassadors, 28 Consuls General, Heads of 3 Thai Permanent Missions to the United Nations and ASEAN, as well as Thai representative." 

So I think this is a pretty big deal. It's clear to me that just having done Visa work over the years, you can kind of see how even Visa Policy can impact a country's economy, you can just see it. I mean in the United States for example, I have often kind of lamented the fact that Tourist Visas to the United States are so difficult due to what is called section 214B of the Immigration and Nationality Act because I think maybe America is losing some tourism money as a result of an inability to issue a large number of Tourist Visas. The same could be said maybe here in Thailand. We are really seeing major movements to get as many tourists into Thailand Visa-free channels this past couple of months and I really have to say, this is a good idea. Trying to encourage tourism by saying hey look, we are going to try to take down as many of the roadblocks as we can to getting into Thailand and just being here and having a good time, again truly tourists. 

Now we have discussed in many other videos, those who want to live here you need to get a Non-Immigrant Visa; those who want to retire here, again same deal, there are long-term visas for those folks. But when it comes to encouraging tourism, especially for relatively short stays, I would say stays under 90 days, again this is going to be something that is going to be essentially driven at the Foreign Ministries. And as a result of that, a change at that Foreign Ministry level could have a tremendous impact on what goes on within the Thai Economy especially from a tourism perspective. So I am really glad to see the Thai Government is taking this issue seriously and it looks to me like they found an effective way sort of tactically if you will, to approach this problem and I think it will ultimately have a really good outcome.