JP/13/moneymatter

JP/13/moneymatter

Toyota using Thailand as Asian base

BANGKOK : Japan's Toyota Motor Corp. is to join other major automakers in using Thailand as a production base for exports within Asia, Industry Minister Suriya Jungrungreangkit reportedly said Thursday.

Suriya said he had received written confirmation from Toyota chairman Fujio Cho that the firm will establish an export production base for one-ton pickup trucks in the kingdom, reports said.

Toyota will invest 10 billion baht (US$230 million) in its existing plant to produce an extra 150,000 pickups per year from 2004, the minister was quoted as saying in the Business Day and other dailies.

"The Toyota president will meet Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and visit the Toyota factory in Samut Prakan on March 14 and 15," he was quoted as saying.--AFP

S.Korea says firm on power privatization

SEOUL : South Korea's labor minister said on Thursday the government would stick firmly to plans to privates the electricity sector despite a strike by power workers who oppose the scheme.

The government's National Labor Relations Commission will hold mediation talks later on Thursday with representatives of 5,000 union workers at power plants of state-run Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO).

"The privatization policy has already been set and passed by the National Assembly (parliament)," Labor Minister Bang Yong- seok told Reuters in an interview on day 11 of the strike.

"I see zero possibility to change this policy. I can assure you the government policy will not change and it will not accept the union demand that privatization should be repealed."

Parliament approved the privatization plan in Dec. 2000. As a first step, KEPCO last April broke up its power generation operations into six units.

Five thermal power units are to be sold off beginning this year, while the nuclear unit will stay in state hands. Unions fear privatization will cost jobs.--Reuters

Turkey needs to attract more FDI

ISTANBUL, Turkey: Turkey needs to attract five or six times its current level of foreign investment to achieve a lasting recovery from an economic crisis that has seen living standards slump, a World Bank official said Wednesday.

"The success of (the government's) economic program and its ability to deliver benefits to its population depends vitally on its ability" to lure more foreign investors, Ajay Chhibber, the World Bank's Turkey desk chief, told a conference in Istanbul.

He said Turkey, the International Monetary Fund's biggest debtor, could no longer fund growth by borrowing abroad, and needed at least US$5 billion to $6 billion in direct foreign investment (FDI) every year.

Currently, Turkey attracts an average $1 billion annually -just a third of neighboring Bulgaria, which has a far smaller population and economy. --AP

U.S. economy showed improvement: Fed

WASHINGTON : Boosted by gains in retail sales, the U.S. economy showed hints in the first two months of the year that it was recovering from recession, the Federal Reserve said on Wednesday.

"A majority of Federal Reserve districts report some signs of improvement in economic conditions in January and early February," the Fed said in its "beige book," an anecdotal report card on economic conditions across the country.

The survey is based on reports from the Fed's 12 district banks and their regional business contacts.

"Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Dallas, Richmond, Kansas City and San Francisco report modest improvements in retail sales recently compared with the end of last year. Retail results were more mixed in the other districts," the Fed said.

Fed policymakers will mull the report at the March 19 meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, the central bank's interest-rate setting panel.--Reuters