Thailand Financial News

To engender an entrepreneurial spirit among 120,000 vocational school students from 804 schools across the country, The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) is co-hosting the project: “Towards Innovative and Business-Minded Vocational Students”. The Exchange, in conjunction with the Vocational Education Commission (VEC), Office for SME Promotion (OSMEP), and the National Institute for Development Administration (NIDA), has co-hosted two projects aimed at developing vocational school students’ professional and life skills, SET’s Capital Market Education Division Chairman Mr.

Punsak Vejanurug said. “The ‘Making Sense of Money’ course, co-developed by SET and Ministry of Education, will be compulsory for vocational students from the second semester of 2006. In addition, there will be a business planning competition for these students to boost their business skills before graduation,” Mr. Punsak added. Thailand needs professionals to drive the country’s economy. Therefore enabling vocational students to mature into capable entrepreneurs is crucial for the country, VEC Secretary-General Mr. Weerasak Wongsombat said. “Nurturing new entrepreneurs now, so that in the future they can initiate their own ‘Smart SMEs’, complements Thailand’s SME promotion strategy,” OSMEP Director Ms. Chitraporn Techacharn declared. NIDA’s Business School Dean Assoc. Prof. Dr. Pradit Wanarat noted: “This project will not only benefit the students, through academic input and practical  experience, but the teachers and advisors as well.” Apart from this project, SET and VEC will produce a curriculum and study materials tailored to vocational school students. Teaching and learning materials, covering the compulsory subjects “Personal Finance” and “Business and Entrepreneurship”, together with facilities for e-learning, will be distributed to every vocational college under VEC supervision. It is also planned to promote the curriculum to private vocational schools. In addition to the annual target of 120,000 students, there will be training for 1,000 teachers in Bangkok and the provinces. 200 teams of students, from the 300 which applied, have been selected to join the program. They will first receive personal finance and entrepreneurship training. Twenty-two teams will qualify for the final round, and will attend a seven-day intensive course on formulating and presenting business plans. They will present their business plans on September 29 – 30, 2006, to the assessment committee.  Total prize money is more than THB 4.0 million. For more information about the SET-OSMEP project, please contact either OSMEP on 0-2527-8800 ext. 311, 512; the SET Call Center on 0-2229-2222, or visit www.tsi-thailand.org .
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