Thailand's exports are expected to grow 5.5% this year after a strong rebound last year, says the Thai National Shippers' Council (TNSC).
Ghanyapad Tantipipatpong, TNSC chairwoman, said exports will remain on course to reach US$230 billion (7.42 trillion baht) for 2017, boosted by growing international trade and global economic expansion.
Other key drivers include economic growth of key trading partners, strong demand for Thai goods in the global market, rising oil prices and resumed political contact with the EU after more than three years of suspended relations in protest of the military coup in 2014, she said.
"Based on the performance in first 11 months of 2017, we're quite confident that the country's export growth will exceed 10% last year, while this year's figure is likely to rise 5.5% this year with economic growth of 3.8-4%," she said.
The Commerce Ministry reported in late December that exports rose 13.4% year-on-year in November to $21.4 billion, marking a double-digit rise for the seventh straight month and the highest growth in 58 months.
Imports in November totalled $19.7 billion, up 13.7% year-on-year, yielding a trade surplus of $1.77 billion on the month.
For the 11 months, the shipments totalled $217 billion, up 10% year-on-year, as rising demand boosted orders in all export segments.
Solid export growth had prompted the Commerce Ministry last month to set an initial 2018 export growth target of 6-6.5% this year at about $250 billion.
But Ms Ghanyapad said a strong baht remains a key threat. She urged the government to help step up tackling the issue.
The TNSC on Friday is scheduled to discuss the issue with the Bank of Thailand to reflect exporters' growing troubles and negative impact from strong local currency.
An appropriate rate should be an average of 33 baht to the dollar, Ms Ghanyapad said.
"We estimate that every single baht rise [against the dollar] will be a loss of 230 billion baht worth of export income," she said. "This will also send a negative wave to the overall supply chains in the country."
Ms Ghanyapad said the central bank should come up with more stringent measures to rein in short-term capital inflow and curb currency speculation.
"We all want to know the amount of the daily capital inflow so that we can prepare ourselves for the impact," she said. "The Finance Ministry should also consider using the country's existing hefty foreign reserves to invest more in infrastructure development and projects in the Eastern Economic Corridor to reduce foreign borrowings and prevent capital inflow."
