Deputy Prime Minister Yodchanan Wongsawat believes he has found the key to unlocking Thailand’s decades-long middle-income trap: Human capital development.
Yodchanan is now staking the country’s future on an ambitious education roadmap aimed at lifting Thailand into a high-value economy.
"The restructuring will be done through education-centred legislative reform dubbed the Human Capital bill," he explained, referring to his plan to prepare a groundbreaking national education bill.
As minister of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation, Yodchanan is one of eight Cabinet members who hail from the Pheu Thai Party – the second-largest coalition partner. The other key portfolios under the party's control are Education, Labour, Social Development and Human Security, and Agriculture and Cooperatives.
Yodchanan’s reforms are designed to expand education beyond the classroom, building the strong foundation of human capital necessary to thrive in an increasingly disruptive and volatile global economy.
The four pillars of reform
Yodchanan said the “human capital bill” had four aims:
1. Improving the professional abilities of teachers.
2. Creating flexible learning paths supported by students' rights centres.
3. Maximising the potential of free education through better fund allocation.
4. Developing human resources to meet specific labour market demands via a "Productivity Superboard".
He said the reform strategy would also synchronise the separate authorities that govern the education sector. "We will pursue these goals by breaking silos," he declared, adding that the public and private sectors would also collaborate to forge a learning ecosystem that meets real-world demands.
The bill will serve as a cornerstone of the new government’s vision for national development through science and technology.
"Our goal is to meet the demands of the job market and create opportunities for everyone," Yodchanan said. "Good education will provide the country with capable people, who will be key to building a strong foundation for Thailand's new growth engine."
He claimed the human capital bill has combined the strengths of all education-related bills proposed by other parties to speed up the legislative process and set a clear direction.
"We will do this within two years," he said.
Passed in 1999, the current National Education Act is widely considered outdated, but efforts to roll out upgraded legislation have failed so far.
Late last year, MPs were poised to review a new National Education Bill, but the process was cut short when a snap election was called and the House was dissolved.
Can political will crush bureaucratic obstinacy?
Asst Prof Athapol Anunthavorasakul praised the first-time minister’s push for education reform, adding that such vision is rare among politicians.
"He took over with a clear political will to address structural problems," said the Chulalongkorn University Faculty of Education lecturer.
The professor noted that instead of permitting different agencies to work independently, Yodchanan has pledged to promote interagency collaboration to implement his strategy.
"When all sides focus on working separately for short-term goals, effort tends to be wasted. Strong collaboration, however, can deliver short, medium and long-term goals," Athapol said.
However, he warned that several structural obstacles still lie in Yodchanan's path.
"How far will the collaboration extend among political groups, civil servants and educational stakeholders?" he asked, highlighting the rigid bureaucratic style of working deeply entrenched in Thai agencies. Each agency focuses solely on its key performance indicators (KPIs), he noted.
"This style of working has long been an obstacle to reforming Thailand's educational sector," Athapol said. "Bureaucrats working in the same ministry often don't collaborate, let alone collaborating with different ministries.”
He said the new government plans to tackle this disconnect using tools like the Human Capital Superboard and a roadmap to force the five ministries to work together.
"If this challenge is overcome, we will see a restyled bureaucracy," he said.
Shock of the new
Athapol also cautioned that broader societal collaboration is crucial to human capital reforms.
"The people's sector is worried that if the government rushes to pass the bill, the reforms will be meaningless – like pouring old wine into a new bottle," he said.
The third challenge will be dismantling the structure of traditional education through a "Credit Bank" system, which allows individuals to convert on-the-job knowledge and skills into learning credits toward a certificate or degree.
"But preparing the accreditation process and selling the idea to employers will be hard work," Athapol said.
The fourth challenge is ensuring a smooth transition, since all education stakeholders – from teachers to administrators – will need time to adjust and adapt to the new system.
The five-year reform roadmap
On April 20, Education Minister Prasert Jantararuangtong unveiled a five-year education roadmap, set to kick off this year with structural changes such as reducing administrative workloads for teachers so they can focus on the classroom.
Next year, administration and school kitchens will be centralised, a new budgeting system will be introduced, and regional learners' rights protection centres will open.
By 2028, the plan will shift to upgrading the quality of teachers by improving training institutes and preparing them for a new curriculum.
The following year, artificial intelligence (AI) will be applied to support teachers' work and further improve budget distribution.
By the fifth year (2030), the goal is for new graduates to be on par with international standards and able to secure high-quality jobs.
"While we are preparing the new national education bill, we will also take action on several other fronts," said Peerawit Khantisuk, a member of the Pheu Thai policy panel.
Agencies under the plan would function like a well-oiled machine from day one, he vowed. "We have even co-opted the Commerce Ministry to help ease financial pressures on parents so that the number of dropouts will decline," he added.
The elephant in the room
Prof Sompong Jitradub, an adviser to the Equitable Education Fund (EEF) executive committee, welcomed the push for education reform, remarking that "overall, the signs are positive".
He said that the Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation Ministry is headed in the right direction with its focus on research and innovation.
"However, this only addresses 30 per cent of the problem," he said, adding that the new government has yet to address the most significant hurdle – a heavily centralised bureaucracy which continues to restrict any significant moves for reform.
