Mr. Somchai Sujjapongse, the director general of the Customs Department, visited the officials at Chiang Khong, Chiang San and Mae Sai Customs Office
.
.
CHIANG RAI – Customs Department director-general Somchai Sujjapongse has opened the newly expanded Chiang Khong customs office building on 25 rai of land, designed to speed up the movement of cargoes between Thailand and neighboring Laos and China.
Somchai Sujjapongse said Chiang Khong customs checkpoint was responsible for border trade via land and water transport in four districts of Chiang Rai and two districts in Phayao. The previous single-building facility was too small to handle the growing volume of exports and imports between the two neighbors.
The aerial view of the new Chiang Khong customs office building opened on Wednesday to serve rising border trade with Laos and China
.
Chiang Khong is a main point on the 1,800 kilometer R3A highway linking Thailand and Kunming in China.
The new building, built in Lanna style, is on 25 rai of land. The new facilities include X-ray equipment for container inspection and a parking area for up to 50 trucks at a time. It will facilitate the movement of shipments between Thailand and Laos, and cargoes in transit between Thailand and China, Mr Somchai said.
According to the Commerce Ministry, bilateral trade between Thailand and Laos was 175.5 billion baht in 2014, up 13.06% from 2013, with Thai exports worth 129.66 billion baht.
For the first seven months of 2015, total bilateral trade was 107 billion baht, up 6.5% from the same period in 2014, with Thai exports totaling 79.7 billion baht, up 4.36%.