Thailand’s policy readiness in supporting physical activity promotion for all populations.

Background: Thailand has been working on health promotion policies since the signing of the 2010 Toronto Charter, and through the leadership of the Thai Health Promotion Foundation (ThaiHealth). The country has committed to support and promote physical activity (PA) for Thais in order to achieve and maintain good health. PA has also been entered as a national agenda under the country’s Promotion Plan for 2018–30. This presentation aims to assess Thailand’s policy readiness in supporting physical activity promotion for all populations.

Policy Components: We collected 384 policy and strategy documents, rules, regulations, legislation, and guidelines on PA from online public databases and divided them into 8 domains following ISPAH’s recommendation on investments that works for PA. We evaluated and scored the policy documents using the Comprehensive Analysis of Policy on Physical Activity (CAPPA) framework, focusing on three indicators: Type of policy, Stage of policy cycle, and Policy resources.

Evaluation: The highest policy readiness was found in the field of public education and mass media, shown by adequate amounts of policies/programs, available either at the national or community level, in various policy stages, and in any format. The least readiness was found in the workplace and healthcare settings, indicating a lack of investment in both sectors.

Conclusions: Policies to support physical activity promotion have been readily available in Thailand, for all 8 domains of investment. Varying levels of readiness indicating government priorities and agenda have been primarily focused on the best-buys targeting general populations, and have not yet adequately addressed specific groups of population (workers, patients).

Practical implications: Understanding policy readiness in PA promotion in 8 domains is important to evaluate the current policy practices. From this point, how far the policies have been implemented and the likelihood of public participation can be estimated.

Funding: Thai Health Promotion Foundation