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Asia and Pacific > Thailand

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Cover Policy Papers
Operational Guidance Note for IMF Engagement on Social Spending Issues
International Monetary Fund. Strategy, Policy, & Review Department
and
International Monetary Fund. Fiscal Affairs Dept.
This note provides general guidance on the operationalization of the strategy for IMF engagement on social spending. Social spending plays a critical role as a key lever for promoting inclusive growth, addressing inequality, protecting vulnerable groups during structural change and adjustment, smoothing consumption over the lifecycle, and stabilizing demand during economic shocks. Social spending policies have also been playing an important role in tackling the structural challenges associated with demographic shifts, gender inequality, technological advances, and climate change. This note builds on a series of notes on IMF engagement on specific social spending issues since the publication of the 2019 strategy paper and provides operational guidance on when and how to engage on social spending issues, in the context of surveillance, IMF-supported programs, and capacity development.
Keywords:
social spending; spending adequacy; spending efficiency; fiscal sustainability; social spending conditionality; social spending floor; social safety nets; education; health; pensions.; spending issue; transparency policy; I. social spending data; IMF capacity development; Health care spending; Education spending; West Africa; Sub-Saharan Africa
Cover Departmental Papers
Asia’s Perspectives on Climate Change: Policies, Perceptions, and Gaps
Ms. Era Dabla-Norris
,
Mr. Thomas Helbling
,
Kenichiro Kashiwase
,
Giacomo Magistretti
, and
Mouhamadou Sy
Asia and the Pacific’s green transition will have far-reaching implications for the global economy. Over the past decades, the region has become the engine of global economic growth. With relatively heavy reliance on coal and high energy intensity, the region has recently become the largest contributor to growth in global GHG emissions, accounting for nearly 40 percent of the total emissions in 2020. Achieving net zero by 2050 requires an energy transition at an unprecedented scale and speed, even as the region must ensure energy security and affordability. The region must also address its vulnerability to climate change as it comprises many countries highly exposed to climate hazards increasing in severity and frequency with global warming. If managed well, the green transformation in Asia and the Pacific will create opportunities for economies not only in the region, but also around the world for inclusive and sustainable growth. The global economy is still far from achieving net zero by 2050, and the Asia and the Pacific region must play its part to deliver on mitigation and adaptation goals. Understanding Asia’s perspectives on the constraints and issues with climate ambitions, climate policy actions, and constraints is central for devising climate strategies to meet climate goals. To this end, this chapter draws on novel surveys of country authorities and public in the region to distill climate ambitions and challenges faced and identify sources of major gaps in achieving mitigation and adaptation goals. Measures to help close the gaps are drawn from policy discussions with country authorities in bilateral surveillance and related studies.
Keywords:
Asia; Climate Change; Mitigation; Adaptation; Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs); Industrial Policy; Energy Transition; Renewables; Green Technology; Climate Finance; Critical Minerals; IMF country authority climate survey; IMF country staff report; mitigation policy; Policy instrument; IMF Library; Greenhouse gas emissions; Climate policy; Asia and Pacific; Global; Middle East
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Lao People’s Democratic Republic: Technical Assistance Report on Government Finance Statistics Mission (October 4-29, 2021)
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
This paper presents Lao People’s Democratic Republic’s Technical Assistance report on government finance statistics (GFS) mission. There has been a progress on a gradual basis in the timeliness of GFS compilation and dissemination to the IMF due to an improvement in coordination between the Fiscal Policy and Law Department and data providers on the provision of source data, but these data are still not reconciled in a more regular and timelier basis. Monthly budget execution data which is used for GFS compilation, such as other allowances and subsidies in expenditure in particular, are aggregated and prepared according to source data from the data providers. The Annual budget for FY2022 including fiscal package including fiscal measures for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic response was submitted to the National Assembly in Nov/Dec 2021. The report recommends to coordinate with relevant departments including the Budget Department in the reporting system and/or the Inter-ministerial Committee to collect data for COVID-19 related spending for tracing and monitoring the spending.
Keywords:
IMF capacity development office; PSDS data compilation; IMF's Statistics Department; execution data; data dissemination to IMF; Government finance statistics; Budget execution and treasury management; Capital spending
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Lao People’s Democratic Republic: Technical Assistance Report-Government Finance Statistics and Public Sector Debt Statistics
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
This technical assistance (TA) report on government finance statistics (GFS) covers the remote TA to the Ministry of Finance (MOF) during September 21–October 2 and December 14–18, 2020 and March 9–13 and April 19–23, 2021 (which was extended to May 2021). These peripatetic activities were conducted remotely due to the travel restrictions resulting from the COVID-19 situation. This report documents the main achievements from these activities. These activities were part of the GFS and Public Sector Debt Statistics (PSDS) project funded by the Government of Japan (JSA3) and implemented by the IMF Statistics Department (STA) and the IMF Capacity Development Office in Thailand (CDOT).
Keywords:
MOF website; IMF capacity development office; IMF's Statistics Department; MOF staff; government finance information system; TA for April; Government finance statistics; COVID-19; Budget planning and preparation; Data collection; Budget execution and treasury management
Cover IMF Working Papers
Capital Flow Data – A Guide for Empirical Analysis and Real-time Tracking
Mr. Robin Koepke
and
Simon Paetzold
This paper provides an analytical overview of the most widely used capital flow datasets. The paper is written as a guide for academics who embark on empirical research projects and for policymakers who need timely information on capital flow developments to inform their decisions. We address common misconceptions about capital flow data and discuss differences between high-frequency proxies for portfolio flows. In a nowcasting “horse race” we show that high-frequency proxies have significant predictive content for portfolio flows from the balance of payments (BoP). We also construct a new dataset for academic use, consisting of monthly portfolio flows broadly consistent with BoP data.
Keywords:
WP; flow data; portfolio flow; debt flow; flow proxy; IMF balance of payments statistic; portfolio flows; fund flows; balance of payments; coincident indicators; IIF data; IMF balance of payments data; Capital flows; Stocks; Balance of payments statistics; Flow of funds; Emerging and frontier financial markets; Africa; Global
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Myanmar: 2019 Article IV Consultation-Press Release; Staff Report; and Statement by the Executive Director for Myanmar
International Monetary Fund. Asia and Pacific Dept
This 2019 Article IV Consultation focuses on Myanmar’s near- and medium-term challenges and policy priorities and was prepared before COVID-19 became a global pandemic and resulted in unprecedented strains in global trade, commodity and financial markets. It, therefore, does not reflect the implications of these developments and related policy priorities. These developments have greatly amplified uncertainty and could heighten downside risks around the outlook. The IMF staff is closely monitoring the situation, including related policy responses from the authorities, and will continue to work on assessing its impact in the Myanmar economy. Although long-term prospects remain favorable, near-term growth is likely to remain below potential as the correction in real estate market and continued uncertainty weighs on investor sentiment in the runup to the 2020 elections. Starting FY2020/21, bank deleveraging will further slow credit and constrain gross domestic product growth as borrower’s true ability to repay is revealed with term loans coming due and banks restructure in earnest.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; CBM financing; financing; CDOT; CBM; headline inflation; FX auction rule; foreign exchange; monetary policy effectiveness; financing option; External sector statistics; Monetary operations; Global; Southeast Asia; Asia and Pacific; Exchange rates
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Myanmar: Technical Assistance Report-External Sector Statistics Mission
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
This Technical Assistance Report paper highlights that the work on verifying reasonable size of coverage adjustments for Myanmar’s imports was addressed during the mission, using bilateral trade data from Thailand and China. The mission illustrated how granular data can be used to help determine proper adjustments to improve the coverage of the International merchandise trade statistics, using Thailand’s data on exports to Myanmar cross-classified by border checkpoint and 2-digit HS code. The data indicated potential under-coverage of Myanmar imports for a few checkpoints sharing land border with Thailand. Although the actual travel expenditure per person per day for certain years is likely to be lower than the time series published by the Ministry of Hotels and Tourism given continuous depreciation of Kyat over the past five years, this factor should unlikely outweigh the effect of growing numbers of inbound tourists. Balance-of-payments compilation file used by the Central Bank of Myanmar Balance of Payments Section has now been modified to accommodate suggested coverage adjustments for imports, and the new estimation model for freight and insurance on imports proposed during March 2019 mission.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; CBM Balance of Payments Section; Myanmar; BPS compiler; mirror data; verification exercise; deputy governor; data request; Imports; External sector statistics; Civil society organizations; Credit
Cover IMF Staff Country Reports
Thailand: Technical Assistance Report-Government Finance Statistics
International Monetary Fund. Statistics Dept.
The main purpose of this mission—undertaken with the support of the Government of Japan’s government finance statistics (GFS) project for selected Asian countries—was to improve the quality of the GFS for nonfinancial public corporations (NFPCs) in Thailand by designing a simpler, but more complete, compilation system for the GFS compilers in the Fiscal Policy Office (FPO) of the Ministry of Finance. The mission also discussed some specific general government GFS data compilation issues with the compilers and recommended some actions that would lead to further improvements in data quality as well as consistency with other macroeconomic statistics. In addition, the mission commended the recent momentum gained by the Public Debt Management Office (PDMO) on the reporting of timely, quarterly public sector debt statistics and encouraged them to continue with the regular, quarterly reporting.
Keywords:
ISCR; CR; financial statement; government finance statistic; Thailand; balance sheet; profit and loss statement; compilation system; TA mission; GFS data; top-level GFS code; GFS compiler; GFS mission; GFS aggregate; Government finance statistics; Financial statements; Public sector; Fiscal accounting and reporting
Cover IMF Working Papers
On the Macroeconomic Consequences of Over-Optimism
Paul Beaudry
and
Tim Willems
Is over-optimism about a country's future growth perspective good for an economy, or does over-optimism also come with costs? In this paper we provide evidence that recessions, fiscal problems, as well as Balance of Payment-difficulties are more likely to arise in countries where past growth expectations have been overly optimistic. To examine this question, we look at the medium-run effects of instances of over-optimism or caution in IMF forecasts. To isolate the causal effect of over-optimism we take an instrumental variables approach, where we exploit variation provided by the allocation of IMF Mission Chiefs across countries. As a necessary first step, we document that IMF Mission Chiefs tend to systematically differ in their individual degrees of forecast-optimism or caution. The mechanism that transforms over-optimism into a later recession seems to run through higher debt accumulation, both public and private. Our findings illustrate the potency of unjustified optimism and underline the importance of basing economic forecasts upon realistic medium-term prospects.
Keywords:
WP; real GDP; noise shocks; sentiment; forecasts; recessions; IMF country team; recession dummy; IMF mission chief; IMF decision makers; IMF team; Estimation techniques; Global
Cover IMF Working Papers
Assessing the Fragility of Global Trade: The Impact of Localized Supply Shocks Using Network Analysis
Ms. Yevgeniya Korniyenko
,
Magali Pinat
, and
Brian Dew
Anecdotal evidence suggests the existence of specific choke points in the global trade network revealed especially after natural disasters (e.g. hard drive components and Thailand flooding, Japanese auto components post-Fukushima, etc.). Using a highly disaggregated international trade database we assess the spillover effects of supply shocks from the import of specific goods. Our goal is to identify inherent vulnerabilities arising from the composition of a country’s import basket and to propose effective mitigation policies. First, using network analysis tools we develop a methodology for evaluating and ranking the supply fragility of individual traded goods. Next, we create a country-level measure to determine each country’s supply shock vulnerability based on the composition of their individual import baskets. This measure evaluates the potential negative supply shock spillovers from the import of each good.
Keywords:
WP; risky product; product network; products description; product fragility; product exporter; international trade; supply shocks; spillovers; network analysis; offragile products; network products; product vulnerability; standard deviation; Imports; Exports; Natural disasters; Export performance; Global