PM Wong to visit Bangkok for first Leaders’ Retreat with Thailand’s Anutin on Sep 2
A delegation of Singapore business leaders will also be present
Add BT as a preferred source
[SINGAPORE] Prime Minister Lawrence Wong will visit Bangkok on Wednesday (Sep 2) for the Singapore-Thailand Leaders’ Retreat, the first for him and Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul.
At the retreat, both leaders will explore new opportunities for collaboration in the green and digital economies, energy resilience, food security and combatting transnational crime, said the Prime Minister’s Office in a press statement on Tuesday.
A delegation of Singapore business leaders will be present at an official dinner hosted in honour of PM Wong by his Thai counterpart.
The delegation comprises, in no particular order:
- Breadtalk Group’s managing director Jonathan Quek
- Capitaland Investment group chief executive Lee Chee Koon
- Grab co-founder and chief executive Anthony Tan
- PSA regional chief executive (South-east Asia) Nelson Quek
- Sats president and chief executive Kerry Mok
- Sea Group’s chief operating officer Ye Gang
- Sembcorp group chief operating officer and GoNetZero platform founder Charles Koh
- Singtel group chief executive Yuen Kuan Moon
- ST Telemedia Global Data Centres president and group chief executive Bruno Lopez
- Temasek Foundation chairman Jennie Chua
- UOB Thailand president and chief executive Richard Maloney
The two prime ministers will witness the exchange of a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in social sector development between Singapore’s Ministry of Social and Family Development and Thailand’s Ministry of Social Development and Human Security.
They will also review long-standing defence and economic cooperation between the two countries, and exchange views on international and regional developments.
PM Wong will be accompanied by his wife Loo Tze Lui; Coordinating Minister for Public Services and Minister for Defence Chan Chun Sing; Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan; Minister for Sustainability and the Environment and Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations Grace Fu; Minister for Social and Family Development Masagos Zulkifli; and Minister for Digital Development and Information Josephine Teo.
This trip reciprocates the Thai premier’s official visit to Singapore in November 2025, two months after he first took office.
Longstanding bilateral ties
This is the fifth edition of the highest-level bilateral platform between both countries, with the previous one held in 2015 between Senior Minister Lee Hsien Loong and former premier Prayut Chan-o-cha in Singapore.
An earlier edition took place in 2005; two were held in 2003.
Singapore was Thailand’s largest source of foreign direct investment last year at US$17.57 billion. The kingdom was Singapore’s ninth-largest trading partner, with bilateral trade amounting to some S$52.4 billion in 2025, up 17.8 per cent from the year before.
Singapore’s top exports to Thailand consist of electronic products, organic chemicals, petroleum and plastic products.
Both countries are at the forefront of financial connectivity in South-east Asia.
The neighbours were responsible for launching in 2021 the world’s first linkage of real-time payment systems between Singapore’s PayNow and Thailand’s PromptPay; and Asean’s first exchange-level depository receipts cooperation in 2023.
Under the scheme, local investors can trade shares of Thai-listed blue-chip companies, such as food retailer CP All; oil and gas giant PTT Exploration and Production; and electronics manufacturer Delta Electronics.
On the green economy front, the two countries inked in August 2025 an implementation agreement on carbon credits cooperation – Singapore’s first with an Asean member state. The first call for project applications under the agreement was launched in March this year.
Both nations are also part of the Laos-Thailand-Malaysia-Singapore Power Integration Project launched in 2022. Its first phase allowed the Republic to import up to 100 megawatts (MW) of renewable hydropower from Laos, via Thailand and Malaysia; the second phase increased electricity trading to a maximum of 200 MW.
Decoding Asia newsletter: your guide to navigating Asia in a new global order. Sign up here to get Decoding Asia newsletter. Delivered to your inbox. Free.
Copyright SPH Media. All rights reserved.
