Private Consumption

Highlights

• Private consumption in Thailand amounted to about 4.99 trillion THB (143 billion USD) in 2008, or about 55 percent of GDP. Over half of expenditures were for non-durable goods such as food and drink, public utilities such as electricity, water and gas. Services accounted for about 25 percent of expenditures, with the remainder going for semi-durable and durable goods such as clothing, home furnishings, electrical appliances, vehicles, and homes.

• Private consumption expenditures, or household expenditures, in fourth quarter, fiscal 2008 rose by 2.2 percent, down from 2.7 percent in the previous quarter. The lower growth rate was a consequence of a shrinking economy and public loss of confidence in the economy and in future employment. Household expenditures for all of 2008 rose by 2.5 percent, an improvement over the 1.6 percent of the previous year, fed by economic expansion in the first half of the year, prior to the onset of the global financial crisis.

• Private consumption in 2009 is likely to encounter heavy pressures from increasing unemployment and falling personal incomes, effects of the global economic crisis. KResearch therefore projects that household expenditures for 2009 will fall by as much as one percent, even after the situation is ameliorated by stimulus funds injected into the economy by the state.