On 16 June 2011, Mr. Kasit Piromya, Minister of Foreign Affairs, met with Mr. Pierre Jaffre, Senior Vice President Asia of the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company N.V. (EADS), which manufactures aerospace, defence and Airbus aircrafts. The meeting was a follow-up of the Foreign Minister’s visit to France in June last year, whereby he proposed that the company use Thailand as a regional base for Airbus spare-parts production. EADS-Airbus has thus decided to expand its investment projects in Thailand by setting up a new aircraft parts and sub-assembly manufacturing factory in 2011 at Amata City Industrial Estate in Rayong Province. This investment project will create 400 jobs by the year 2014.
In addition, EADS expressed interest in investing and cooperating further with Thailand on biofuel production for the aviation industry. The idea is to jointly develop green technology, as well as to use Thailand as a supplier of algae fuel production for Airbus and other commercial airlines. In turn, this biofuel project with EADS will not only help increase income and generate jobs for local farmers, but will also provide an opportunity for Thailand to learn and share high value - added research and technology on green industry with France.
For further information, please contact the Press Division, Department of Information, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Tel.02-6435170, Fax.02-6435169, E-mail: div0704@mfa.go.th