Thailand is actively pursuing a long-standing ambition to establish a crucial logistics link between the Indian and Pacific oceans, with recent disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz providing fresh impetus for the project.
The government is now seeking to attract Singapore as a potential investor for the ambitious ‘Land Bridge’ initiative.
This renewed focus on the Land Bridge project, which would traverse Thailand’s narrow southern peninsula, comes as global shipping chokepoints, including the nearby Malacca Strait, have demonstrated their vulnerability.
While a previous administration had drafted legislation for the Land Bridge, the proposal faltered amid political instability, leaving public hearings and environmental assessments incomplete, and facing some local resistance.
Transport Minister Phiphat Ratchakitprakarn indicated at the weekend that a proposal is anticipated to reach the cabinet in June or July.
The government plans to seek investors for the estimated 1 trillion baht ($30.97 billion) project, with a potential commencement in the third quarter.
A decades-old idea, the Land Bridge envisions two deep-sea ports, one in Ranong on the Andaman Sea and another in Chumphon on the Gulf of Thailand, linked by 90 km (56 miles) of road and rail plus energy infrastructure like pipelines.
The project would offer an alternative route to the Malacca Strait, the 900-km (550-mile) long channel bounded by Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore, which provides the shortest sea route from East Asia to the Middle East and Europe.
Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul outlined the plan during a meeting on Monday with Chan Chun Sing, the defence minister of Singapore, a big regional investor that sits at the end of the Malacca Strait, through which more than 100,000 mostly commercial ships passed last year.
“He sees it as an economic opportunity for Thailand and for foreign investors, if the project can be successfully pushed forward,” Thai government spokesperson Rachada Dhanadirek said, referring to Chan, adding he expressed interest in the plan.
Indonesia’s finance minister last week caused a stir by openly musing about ways countries could impose tolls on ships as a way to monetise the Malacca Strait, before saying that would not be possible and leading to several subsequent clarifications.
The Land Bridge is regarded as more viable than the “Kra Canal”, a centuries-old idea to cut a shipping passage across southern Thailand, which met resistence due to environmental, financial and security concerns.
