The Crisis of 1997

Bankers called the unpegging of the baht against the dollar in July, 1997, "a managed float". In fact, this euphemism could not soften the impact of the currency devaluation that pushed Thailand into an economic recession like nothing else before. The government assured the private sector that industry stands to benefit. Food exporters , in particular, could look forward to a windfall of dollars, predicted analysts. To some extent, such forecast appears to have spurred increased tuna production.

Instead of plateauing or worse, declining, as many feared, Thailand's exports of tuna products rallied through the trough of 1996 to reach a crest last year nearly equal to that of 1994. With an export volume of 259,063 metric tons , equivalent to 31.59 million standard cases, 1999 turned out to be the third most productive year after 1991 and 1994 in the twenty - year history of the industry. In terms of value, Thai tuna brought in 28 billion baht worth of export dollars in 1998 and 25 billion baht in 1999 -- or US$625 million at an exchange rate of 40 baht to a US$. True, these figures are a mere fraction of total export revenue, 1/88th of the the 2.2 trillion baht (US$5.5 billion) total for 1998, to be more precise.

	Export Revenue