BANGKOK, July 3 (Xinhua) -- Thailand's Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Surapong Suebwonglee on Thursday urged the Bank of Thailand and its Monetary Policy Committee to consider increasing the interest rate but with caution.

    Surapong said that raising the interest rate would have positive and negative repercussions on the public and various segments of government, business and academia.

    Should the deposit rate be raised while the inflation rate is high, it would help boost the incomes of depositors and could serve as an alternative way to bring about savings, Surapong was quoted by the Thai News Agency as saying.

    He added that the lending rate hike would fuel costs of entrepreneurs and the burdens of borrowers of housing loans.

    Therefore, Surapong said he wanted financial institutions, the central bank and the Monetary Policy Committee to consider the issue of interest rate adjustment properly.

    Regarding the interest rate hike, he conceded, the government needed to adjust its investment plans for many mega projects, requiring a total investment of 1.7 trillion baht (53 billion U.S. dollars), more carefully so that they would not affect the fiscal position in the long term.