Thailand has room to use fiscal and monetary measures to manage the strength of the baht but there is no need to use tax measures yet, the country's finance minister said on Friday.
Southeast Asia's second-largest economy is heavily reliant on exports, which have been hit by the Sino-US trade tension. Currency appreciation has added to the pressure.
Uttama Savanayana told reporters that he would work closely with the central bank to manage the baht, which rose nearly 9% against the US dollar in 2019, making it Asia's best-performing major currency.
"There is room, for both fiscal and monetary measures, that can be implemented," he said.
"Now it's still the duty of the central bank to take care of this. Additional steps will be introduced as appropriate".
Despite the central bank's earlier measures and two cuts in the benchmark interest rate to a record low of 1.25% in 2019, the baht remains firm, underpinned by the country's large current account surplus.
The currency traded at 30.15 per US dollar on Friday, after hitting 29.91 on Monday, the highest in more than six years.
The strong baht also threatens tourism, another key growth driver, at a time of soft domestic demand.
However, Uttama said he expected this year's economic growth to be higher than 2019 and was preparing additional measures to help stimulate domestic activity.
On Tuesday, the ministry will propose measures to the cabinet worth more than 100 billion baht ($3.32 billion), including soft loans, to help small and medium enterprises, he said.
The central bank expects economic growth of 2.8% this year and 2.5% in 2019, which would be the weakest pace since 2014, when there was an army coup.
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