Nowadays, Thailand is rapidly strengthening its transportation infrastructure, and the construction of high-speed rail is a task that Thailand attaches great importance to.
As early as 2017, the mainland and Thailand began to work closely together in the construction of high-speed rail.
In addition, Thailand has launched a high-speed rail construction project on its own, which costs up to 420 billion baht and is expected to be completed by 2032.
What is the reason why Thailand has chosen to cooperate with Japan in the absence of China?
Sino-Thai cooperation on high-speed rail
In October 2023, Thai Prime Minister Seta communicated with the mainland, and when the future development of China and Thailand in 2024 was introduced, the construction of the China-Thailand high-speed railway was mentioned.
"The Sino-Thai high-speed railway must not only continue to be built, but also be delivered as soon as possible, so that the connection between China and China can be completed as soon as possible."
It is not for nothing that the Thai Prime Minister said this, because the progress of the high-speed rail project undertaken by China in Thailand is indeed very slow.
As early as 2010, China and Thailand discussed the construction of the Sino-Thai high-speed railway, and the project only officially started in 2017, and after five years of construction, the construction of the project is only 15% complete.
Subsequently, it took another year for the Thai government to increase the progress of the project to 25%, which is why the Thai prime minister kept urging to speed up the construction of the China-Thailand high-speed railway.
The Thai government is not urging the speed of China's construction, but the speed of the Thai government's fund-raising, and the reason why the construction of the China-Thailand high-speed railway is slow is because Thailand's funds are not in place.
In the past, the Thai government was reluctant to build Thailand's high-speed rail in debt, and they usually had money in the government's hands when they were free, so they would allocate some project funds to carry out work related to the construction of high-speed rail.
If the Thai government does not have enough funds, it will put aside the construction of high-speed rail projects, and such a way of construction capital investment is destined to be very slow in the construction of China-Thailand high-speed railway.
Originally, the project was expected to open to traffic in 2027, and if the funds had been invested like this, it would not be possible to complete the project within the expected time.
Thailand shouted that we had no money, but turned around and handed over a large order for the construction of high-speed rail to the Japanese.
Thailand has chosen to partner with Japan
In parallel with the cooperation with China, the Thai government also wants to build a high-speed rail line between the cities of Bangkok and Chiang Mai, with a total length of about 680 kilometers.
This attracted the attention of the Japanese side, and after evaluating the project, Xiao Ri won the construction project from Bangkok to Chiang Mai in Thailand with very low interest rates and technology transfer as cooperation conditions.
According to information provided by relevant media, Thailand will invest up to 420 billion baht in the construction of high-speed rail projects in Bangkok and Chiang Mai, which is converted into about 84.5 billion yuan.
After Xiao Ri won the project, their "despicable" appearance appeared again, and the Japanese contractor launched a detailed investigation of Thailand's economic level.
They learned that the population and tourist numbers in the Chiang Mai area of Thailand are very limited, and if this high-speed railway is completed and opened to traffic, it will not be profitable in a short period of time.
According to Japanese media reports, there are many uncertainties about whether the Bangkok-Chiang Mai high-speed rail line will eventually be able to reach a cooperation, because survey data shows that it will take about 50 years for the high-speed rail to become profitable.
Therefore, the cunning Japanese made the decision that for the project of building a high-speed railway in cooperation with Thailand, they would only participate in the construction of the project, and would not invest in the project.
The Thai government, for its part, could not come up with such a large amount of money, and wanted to invest together with Japan, and then complete the construction work, and finally achieve the goal of mutual profit.
Thailand and Japan did not reach an agreement on the investment after many negotiations, so the project was shelved for a long time because the Japanese contractor was very insidious and cunning.
Xiao Ri will first win the project by unscrupulous means, and then evaluate and investigate the project, this kind of cooperative construction method, Thailand has never seen it, which makes the Thai government very passive.
If Thailand wants to start the construction of this high-speed railway, it is likely that the project will have to be paid in full before the construction can start, which is a very high amount of 420 billion baht, which is very high for Thailand.
Coupled with the "high investment and long return cycle" of the project, the Thai government needs to make a deliberate decision.
Thailand has also tried to make efforts and proposed to the Japanese contractor to reduce the cost of building this high-speed railway, but the answer received from Japan is that it does not agree.
Japan is also unable to come up with a more effective way to reduce the cost of building this high-speed railway.
Thailand's dream of high-speed rail was ended by Japan
The reality is so cruel, the original opening time of this high-speed railway is expected to be completed in 2023, but now not only has it not been completed, but the cost of this high-speed rail has skyrocketed by billions of yuan.
This situation is caused by many factors, not only in the agreement signed between Thailand and Japan, there are many differences in understanding, but the design plan has been revised many times, which has led to serious delays.
On the other hand, there are many voices in Thailand that have a lot of controversy about the assessment of the expropriation site and the construction environment, which is also the reason for the extension.
It is these factors that have led to a great deal of disagreement within Thailand on the issue of building a high-speed railway, which makes it difficult for this project to move forward in Thailand.
The Japanese contractor far underestimated the difficulty of the construction of this project, and the increasing cost of materials and labor in Thailand, which eventually led to a serious increase in the cost of the entire project.
Xiaori is very "chicken thief", in order not to affect their own interests, they choose to use the "black hand" in technology.
In the absence of quality assurance, the speed of the high-speed train has plummeted from the original 300 kilometers per hour to 180-200 kilometers per hour, and Thailand is very speechless to the Japanese contractor, but there is nothing that can be done.
Japan is building high-speed rail in many countries, and frequent accidents have occurred, and the development of many projects can be described as twists and turns, and many people have begun to question the quality of Japan's high-speed rail.
Japan has a lot of high-speed rail projects that are not going well
In recent years, the development of the mainland in the high-speed rail industry is obvious to all countries in the world, and the rise of the mainland in the high-speed rail industry is an unstoppable and inevitable existence.
On the other hand, in recent years, due to many factors such as Japan's insufficient technical level and insufficient investment funds, many high-speed rail projects built overseas by Japan have not developed smoothly.
In 2006, Japan and Vietnam began discussions on the construction of high-speed rail, and Vietnam intends to build a high-speed rail line with a total length of about 1,500 kilometers in the country.
The high-speed railway, which will connect Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, will boost Vietnam's economy when completed, so the Vietnamese government attaches great importance to this project.
After four years of discussions, Japan and Vietnam were still unable to reach an agreement, and finally the project slowly fell silent, and when the reporter of the Global Times interviewed senior people, they learned the real reason.
Veterans said that the construction period given by the Japanese contractor was long, far beyond Vietnam's estimated time, and not only that, but the asking price of the Japanese side "lion's big mouth" also made Vietnam unacceptable.
After internal calculations and discussions, the Japanese contractor handed over the cost report to the Vietnamese government, and was shocked to see that the total amount of the quotation was very high, reaching about 33% of Vietnam's annual GDP.
At a glance at Vietnam, isn't this offer just "grabbing money"? When the project proposal was sent to the National Assembly of Vietnam, it was directly denied, and it was not even approved for approval.
Not only is the progress of Japan's high-speed rail overseas slow, but even after it is completed and opened to traffic, various problems often occur.
On October 16, 2017, the intercity high-speed rail specially produced by Japan for the United Kingdom was officially put into use in the United Kingdom, and the quality of the high-speed rail that departed from Japan for the first time was shocking.
The high-speed rail built by Japan, due to technical failures, caused the train to depart about 25 minutes late.
Not long after the departure of the high-speed rail, the air conditioner also failed, if the wind could not blow, even if it could be endured, what I didn't expect was that the air conditioner began to leak a lot, causing the inside of the carriage to become a "water curtain hole".
The photo of the train leaking quickly spread all over the British social platform, and the British BBC media commented on the accident as a "cloud" over the new high-speed rail as soon as it completed its first departure.
Similar incidents occur from time to time on Japan's high-speed rail, which shows that Japan's high-speed rail is not only slow to build, but also the quality of high-speed rail cannot be guaranteed.
Seeing that the cooperation with Japan in high-speed rail may be far away, Thailand turned to China and intends to quickly build the high-speed rail project cooperated by China and Thailand.
Previously, the slow construction of the Sino-Thai high-speed railway is mainly due to the lack of funds in Thailand, when the Thai Prime Minister Seta took office, he took a completely different construction strategy from before, he tried his best to raise funds, and it was bound to build the Sino-Thai high-speed railway.
According to the official news released by the mainland, the first phase of the Sino-Thai high-speed railway project has been completed and successfully completed to traffic, and the second phase of the project is progressing smoothly.
It is expected that in 2024, all contracts for the second phase of the Sino-Thai high-speed rail project will be signed and construction will begin, and by the end of 2023, the total progress of the second phase of the project has reached 28.61%, and it is expected to be completed and opened to traffic in 2028.
I have to say that after the Prime Minister of Thailand Seta took office, he has greatly promoted the development of the Sino-Thai high-speed railway, which also confirms from the side that as long as the funds are in place, China's infrastructure will tell the world what is speed and quality in parallel!