Enhancing the food product strengths
In recent years, the organic food of Thailand has maintained a good momentum of growth. The industry strives to make Thailand an organic food production base in the ASEAN region. To this end, the source of production needs to be strictly controlled. For instance, the selection of products and soil improvement need to be authenticated. The Thai government imposes a strict division on producing areas of agricultural products, such as rice and fruit, and promotes the clean way for planting and irrigation among farmers, to improve the quality and value of agricultural products. The Thai Ministry of Commerce is focusing on imparting knowledge of organic food to farmers, continuously collecting information about 'organic food' within the internal database, promoting the Thai organic food at home and abroad, pushing forward the development of organic products and improving its market competitiveness. Currently, the Thai organic products are mainly exported to Europe and the Chinese market only takes up a small proportion of the share.
The Thai Government attaches great importance to supporting the export of small and medium-sized enterprises. The Government will arrange relevant training for the enterprises before they export their products, and lead them to the destination country to learn more about customer habits, channels,the real sales situation and other conditions when they are ready. Through this kind of investigation and matching negotiation, these small and mediumsized enterprises can not only get connections with their partners, but also improve their products to meet the market requirements. Some of the enterprises have certain productive scale, and are able to reach the export standards in terms of production technology and output. However, they are not capable enough to export on their own or to obtain acute market sensitivity. Therefore, we also launched related policies to support them, including joining up these enterprises to go abroad and explore the overseas market together.
The Thai Government also set up a series of certification standards, in order to regularize the development of the food industry in all aspects. In the past decade, the situation wherein the Thai food industry was dominated by the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) has been changed and the industry has gradually formed its own brands, which brought significant improvement and progress to the whole industry. It is also worth noting that the policy of 'Thailand: Kitchen of the World' has been introduced, through which the Government hopes to promote Thai food to the world and to build a national brand.
Promoting Thai food through various channels
Promotion, Ministry of Commerce, Royal Thai Government, has established seven sections in Chengdu, Guangzhou, Shanghai, Kunming, Nanning, Xiamen and Qingdao. In the first-tier cities, we are working to promote the matching between importers and exporters, such as participating in the food exhibitions of all cities, inviting Chinese importers and relevant enterprises to Thailand to visit the food exhibition, enabling them to have a better understanding of Thai food. For exporters, we have facilitated the matching between exporter manufacturers and Chinese importers. Moreover, we hold promotion activities with different supermarkets, including theme events under the policy of 'Thailand: Kitchen of the World', and also constantly adjust our product and marketing strategies according to China market trends and policies. In the second-tier cities, we lay more emphasis on the customer work, such as holding Thai Food Carnival and Food Festival in supermarkets to carry out promotion on the consumer level. Thus, we have direct contacts with consumers and draw their attention to Thai food, in the hope that consumers would take interest in Thai food and buy it through all channels.
We also hope that through different channels, Thai food could become familiar and accessible to consumers. With the prevalence of the internet, an increasing number of Chinese consumers take a keen interest in foreign products (including food), and they have a strong will to shop online, which is undoubtedly an expansion of channels for Thai food. Therefore, e-commerce (including cross-border e-commerce) is also an important sector that requires due attention of the Thai food industry in the future.
We believe that e-commerce is an effective marketing promotion method that accords with the trend in the future, and also a convenient approach for Thai products to enter China market. However, online and offline channels are inseparable because food as products needs to be tasted. Consumers' first taste of the food relies on the offline promotion, while online promotion could propel the follow-up sales.
What's more, TV shopping channels also provide another way for consumers to learn more about Thai food. We will invite them to Thailand to have an in-depth exchange of views with the food manufacturers, to carry out matching and negotiation, and to introduce products. Nowadays, app platforms are very popular in China, and we are planning to directly promote the catering industry of Thailand through this kind of platform.
Apart from the channels, the logistics method is also an important factor. So we pay close attention to China's 'One Belt and One Road'initiative, which is of great significance to Thai products' entering China market. At present, we have started to promote the matching negotiation between the logistics sectors of the two countries, aiming at strengthening cooperation and enhancing efficiency on the logistics level. In shipping, we have cooperation projects in many major ports in China, including Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Shanghai, Qingdao and Xiamen. In road transportation, we have the route starting from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, to Kunming, and to the western part of China. In the past few years, we mainly transported products through the route from the northeast part of Thailand to Laos and Vietnam, and entered China via Guangxi Province. In air transportation, we have cooperation on airline flights with all the major cities in China.
With an enormous population, China has a huge food consumption market. We notice that the Chinese citizen consumption level is increasing constantly in recent years, and Chinese consumers are more concerned about the quality, safety, producing area and production procedures of the products. Along with this trend, Thai food enjoys broad prospects in China. It is a trend to export healthy and quality Thai food to China. In addition, along with the implementation of the two-child policy in China, we also start to pay attention to the infant finger foods and beverage market, hoping that we can provide Chinese consumers with nutritious and quality Thai infant food.
