Bangkok, Thailand, the land of the smiles, one of the hottest destinations for tourists. In 2016, the tourism sector of Thailand has generated a total revenue of 2.5 trillion THB, which contributes to about 9% of its GDP.

With a lot of foreign investments coming into Thailand pouring into sectors such as renewables, technology and industrial real estate, Thailand is predicted to be a powerhouse economy in Southeast Asia by many economists.

However with problems in Thailand such as the enormous wealth gap between the rich and the poor. It’s one of the few countries in the world which I can see the rich and the poor living such vastly different lives.

Thailand, however is not a poor country.

Whoever tells you that Thailand is poor has obviously never lived in this country, with the 50 richest Thais owning a total of 28 billion USD — why does this country face so much political instability, economic inequality and social issues.

Having been raised in Bangkok, Thailand, I can say that we have extremely talented people, home grown, and english educated Thais that studied in some of the finest universities in the world. As well as expats that come developed countries such as Germany, the United States, Japan and South Korea that are eager to make Thailand their home.

It’s an unequal country that is held back by governmental policies which I cannot mention in this article or I will get into trouble and lack of access to good education in many rural areas.

If you lived in Thailand, you would occasionally hear news of a person from a wealthy family going crazy and committing some crime. Why would this happen to the wealthy, when they have everything you could ever want, from fast cars, to crazy parties to the ability to travel anywhere in the world.

Let me explain..

Let’s say you are a wealthy person in Thailand and say your business goes bankrupt from a recession, where do you exactly go? In addition, you have no connections to give you a safety net – you would go to the bottom of the barrel, straight into poverty.

This is the reality of the situation in Thailand and it is my belief that as long as the wealth gap is not fixed, the same themes and problems that haunted the country for the past 20 years will repeat itself.

To continue my example of a wealthy person losing his business during a recession. In a country such as Japan, South Korea, United States or Germany — you would simply dust yourself off and try building another business or get another job. This would not be the case in Thailand, because you have nowhere to go, no future to go to towards. Hence why you see the extreme insecurity of the wealthy in this country, don’t get me wrong, they are insecure because the situation is LITERALLY insecure.

Before we go on any further, what Thailand has going for it?

An attractive country to work and retire would be my answer. Many expats want to make Thailand their home. The first reason would be to escape the drudgery of their home country. Thailand offers the elusive work life balance that many people from more developed countries are dying for. That is why I said that Thailand not only has a lot of home grown talent in this country, a lot of talent also is attracted to this country.

It’s my belief that the tackling of the issue of Thailand will need to come from the development of the lower class through a systemic big picture understanding. Firstly to answer this question, where does poverty come from?

If I was wealthy in Thailand, i could be living in an amazing estate. I would walk out and the moment I step out of my bubble be like “oh my god, what’s wrong with this country.” It is in my hope that this article will reach the right people that have the influence and motivation to bring change to Thailand.

1. Firstly, Improve Quality Of Housing

Firstly would be to solve the problem of real estate. We need governmental project that address the poor housing conditions you see in the slums, as well as the homeless on the street. As with quitting an addiction, there must be a zero tolerance policy with this. Everything comes from your environment, if the environment is good, usually there is a domino effect that keeps it up.

You may have heard of this from your mum and dad, “go and learn what’s it like to be poor and you’ll know how hard life is” — I’ve spent many opportunities in my school years volunteering to help the poor, I never really got into it, rightly so. How does learning to spend time with the poor actually solve poverty????

It helps me understand and gain awareness of the problem but without any solution in sight. Instead of learning what’s it like to be poor. How about teaching the poor what’s it like to be rich. That’s a permanent, more efficient, and mutually beneficial solution.

Just like you would go volunteering for the food shelters, and although I apPlaud the bravery of these people, there is still no systematic change. We need systematic change — to solve things at the root issue.

And this comes from the basics, solving housing issues, in particular poor housing distribution. We have some really good real estate companies that cater to those with money however what we are creating is a two class system. And what happens when there are two sides, there will eventually come a point where the two sides will clash and the system will collapse on itself, it is only a matter of time.

Solve the problem of real estate and upgrade the housing locally, perhaps with a focus on Bangkok first. Raise the standards of acceptable buildings.

2. Secondly, Improve Roads & Logistics.

Civil engineering in road structure needs to be improved. Sois need to be changed in order for walking to be easier. As long as you are walking on a dirty road, then will associate it to it being a dirty place.

It all has to do with the environment you are in.

Traffic accidents in Thailand are ranked 3rd in the entire world. 1st and 2nd ranked countries that those torn by war. I think we have to get the majority of the cars off the roads or we are going to hear “rod-tid”, translating into traffic jam every single day — the amount of cars in this countries on this road is unsustainable. In Tokyo, you have 121 passenger lines. Bangkok runs only on a two-line train system. Improving transportation is a must.

3. Finally, Get Aware Of The Environment

The final thing would be the environment, being more environmentally aware and having a green mindset. Not throwing litter on the floor. Not spitting on the floor. Getting rid of all the excess cars on the streets. Getting rid of all the junk that’s on the walkways.

We will need dust bins which are well designed and for people to start to gain an awareness of how one treats their environment. Take a look at how Japan does it:

Having more places to throw trash would be a start but it is only a band aid solution for the systematic problem which requires education on respecting one’s living space. As you can see in the picture, countries like Japan have designated spaces for each types of trash, this helps people gain an awareness of one’s waste products.

Rules have to be made that people want to follow instead of policies to control people for the sake of controlling people, that’s why no one wants to follow the rules in Thailand.

To recap..

1. Real Estate

2. Civil Engineering

3. Environmental awareness and projects

Those are the three very basic things that needs to be fixed first before we tackle any of the issues relating poverty. It all starts from fixing the environment. Without having respect for the environment, the same themes of corruption will come time and time again.

Take the word: “corruption”, where does it come from. It comes from something becoming dirty, it is no surprise that a country such as Thailand suffers from city pollution problems also has corruption. It starts with cleaning up the space and I believe it does not take a huge effort, it absolutely does not take money, it takes a problem solving mindset and a critically thinking mind.

Cleaning the environment once is a band aid but education is a permanent solution. We want permanent solutions. More education on the importance of the environment and how one relates to it is a must.

Once the basics are handled, then can we can think of raising our GDP because the foundation is fixed.

So Can Do We Do?

This is the difficult part (actually it’s very simple really) but it requires an effort on every Thai citizen.

Thailand is I believe already a developed country, that is on par with Japan, Singapore and South Korea. In terms of revenue, Thailand cannot rely on tourism anymore for one of its main sources of income as the COVID-19 pandemic has exposed so many holes in this industry, it has to transition into a knowledge based economy like many countries in the West.

Education across the board is absolutely vital into this. I cannot comment in depth onto the political situation, but every Thai reading this knows what I am talking about with the situation with the “heads in power” that want to keep people stuck in the mud. It’ll be up to the new generation, to take up positions of power and to create new systems that promote equality, health and finally justice.

The old system of dogma and clinging to the past has to go and it is GOING TO GO for progress.

Financing The Solution

Accounting is the language of money. If a country is broke, it simply means the accounting system is broken.

The accounting system of the country is broken meaning resource allocation is broken. We are now living in the knowledge economy — it’s no longer about who has the most resources but the people that can use their brains to turn these resources into something of value.

This comes the value of entrepreneurship — taking an existing problem and creating a solution to it.

Thailand has money, but i do not care how much money you have in your bank account. If your cash flow statement is broken, in which you have more liabilities than your assets, it does not matter how much money in your bank account — your finances are broken.

We need to allocate the resources onto actually developing the country instead of focusing on things that don’t not matter like saving face and being the top dog for the sake of being the top dog whilst contributing nothing.

Education

As you know, the education system is also completely broken in Thailand. Although I have had the privilege of attending some of the best international schools in this country and yet to this day I have not learnt anything of practical use.

Regardless, the focus has to be on educating the rural and lower classes so everyone can grow together. REAL EDUCATION. Teaching people practical skills like speaking English, personal development and teaching people how to use technology property.

Without proper education, and I am not talking about learning maths and science but in personal development, in knowing your values, in goal setting and learning how to overcoming obstacles, there is no future as the people believe there is no future and thus whatever you believe, you will create that reality.

Thailand’s future may be very bright or a ticking time bomb. But right now, it’s a ticking time bomb, its citizens are unhappy, people blame the rich but what they don’t see is that the rich are also not happy, how can they be happy when everyone is stuck in the mud together.

If you are a Thai or someone that grew up here, you would know that the power that is in charge is destroying the youth and any semblance of a future. It’ll be up to we, the people, the new generation, and anyone that loves this land to erase the mistakes of our predecessors and to create a brighter future for all.

If you liked this article be sure to like it, comment your thoughts and share it with your friends. I plan to post more content on social entrepreneurship pitches like this, startups and finally self improvement on my Linkedin and my medium account. Stay tuned for more.