Foreverford

Hi Mikki,

World wide, numbers ultimately carry the day.

Feelings, Sentiments, Traditions, Politics all are secondary.

It's all about numbers.

If your numbers are good,

you win and thrive and excel.

If your numbers stink,

you fake it,

complain about it,

make excuses,

blame someone else....

protest on your tractor by blocking highways

and flop.

When farmers can't compete on the world market,

when the government can no longer afford to pay the farmers to fail,

and when food prices won't sustain wastefully small scale,

then farmers' children will do something different.

The annual rental price of land is very low compared to the purchase price

In the order of 1:50 out in the country,

with an even wider spread for farm land close to a city or on a main road.

I knew of one piece of ground that was 1:97,

and the foreigner thinking of buying it asked me what I thought.

I said something about 97 ways to lose your shirt all on one day

This means that elderly farmers are too old to work their land

their children are gone to the city and don't plan to return

and the land is idle unless it is rented very inexpensively.

The purchase price is therefore overpriced

This will take time to work out,

because in many cases there is a debt burden driving the "necessary sale price"

There is perceived price justification because they can't afford to sell for less than the debt.

Let's not get into that set of numbers,

but that's also why Thailand farm land price will crash even faster.

Other farmers can't buy out their neighbor because they all are saddled in debt.

There is also a prohibition against foreign entities owning Thailand real estate.

I remember the progressive waves of alarm that surged through the US in the 1980's

The Japanese are buying everything in sight!

The Saudis are going to own it all and we will rent from them in our own country!

The Germans are buying our farmland because they don't have enough in Germany

I said, Let them buy it all,

Who will they buy it from?

and once they Buy, Who will they sell it to?

The closer they get to buying it all,

it will be their money competing with their money,

and who wins?

They can't possibly buy it all

just as you or I couldn't buy it all.

I forecast Thailand's farm land prices to seriously fall,

just because there aren't enough Thais who appreciate a good piece of ground.

Wealthy Thais are typically city people with no connection or understanding of the farm district.

The break in land prices will come when after working parents pass away,

the city based children decide to dump the farm for whatever they can get,

and then again, and again, until the market is flooded.

That said, the true world numbers value of good land

in a no frost tropical climate with plenty of rainfall

is strong.

When a farmer isn't working to avoid the freeze,

a lot more can be done with staging crops,

to make full use of available equipment.

In the tropics we deal with the dry season

as the end of the production year.

That is fixable by irrigation.

Frost isn't fixable by a farm sized heater.

The next step which must be settled is

the corruption of the local government.

When a larger scale farm attempts to do business in an area,

Local officials can make or break an operation,

by their cooperation or obstruction.

I speak from unfortunate experience.

My business is not creating jobs in that village any longer.

They have themselves to blame for their own foolish poverty.

I have myself to blame for trusting their empty talk about wanting business activity.

They actually wanted easy money...a two legged ATM.

I would not pay anything that was not a legitimate business expense.

To even the playing field,

it is true that most tropical climates in the world

also have traditions with built in corruption,

so most everyone with Thailand's growing conditions

also has their self inflicted crippling

I say "most" because I haven't been everywhere and seen everything.

I don't know of an exception to the rule.

People in these places say they have to be corrupt because they are poor.

Nope...backward...you are poor because you are corrupt.

Clean up your act and watch business line up at your door!

Word gets around fast....in both regards...but bad news travels a little faster than good news.

I'm a foreign farm business guy.

If I knew of a country that was corruption free,

I'd leave Thailand in a heartbeat.

There is nothing magical here.

May the best organized win.

May the first tropical climate to mechanize on a large scale thrive and abound.

May the first locale to seriously stomp out corruption be covered up with outside investors.

May the second place finishers continue to notice no difference.

So it seems and in reality is. They have been throwing around a # like 370 acres as being the most efficient piece of farm property to work and manage. There are plenty of individuals that make good profits on multi-thousand acre farms in some o0f the best land in the world in the Sacramento Delta in California but they inherited the land. I don't think they could make it by buying the land. Hell unlevel crop land in Monterey Bay area of California hit $10,000 an acre in the early 80's (I'll take a 100 and don't need a bag to carry it). Impossible for an individual to get into it and make a good profit.

The Japanese came in and started buying all kinds of golf courses, hotels and farms in the US in the 80's and everyone freaked and said Japan was going to own all of America. If I remember the numbers correctly at the time for foreign ownership in the US it was something like 1+% for Japanese, just under 5% for the Brits and the Dutch hold almost 11% of US real estate (are we talking about Dupont and Shell here?). Farm lands have always been a great corporate write-off as short term profits aren't always the motivating factor for corporate purchase of farm land. Like old Will Rogers said, "My daddy told me 'buy real estate, it's a good investment, they don't make it no more' ".

Without good organization at any level you will always be victim to injury, loss of time, efficiency, and profits, that will never change no matter what size of a bite you chose to take off of the apple of farming. When the Japanese were forced to sell Pebble Beach Golf Course in the late 80's because they ran out of money, Clint Eastwood, Arnie Palmer and Peter Uberroth among a few others bought it for about $660 million quite a bit below the $1.2 billion the Japanese had in the deal. So buy man buy then bye bye.

Hey Edge of the Water leasing is a great deal both ways sort of as I have been observing here. I've met Falong that are more than happy to lease out their rice farms and get a % of the crop. We have a leasehold for non-organic growing that is also very reasonable for us but it involves a strictly cash deal as I won't ever give up a % of my crop as I am too much of a gambler to do that. As always we are fortunate and lucky to benefit from your extensive knowledge of all things in farming. All Things in Ford Farming Forever

Osmond,

First question is why is the pump losing the priming water. Check the non-return value on the suction side first. Probably isnt closing fully.

On the output side you can get electrical float switches to operate the pump that control on at a certain level and off when full, or even both. Pressure switching isnt appropriate if you are using a storage tank.

IA

Hey Osmond I assume this is a new problem (losing prime) with an old pump and as I/A says find the problem and fix it. Otherwise are you looking at irrigating and having the tank constantly filling and sometimes the well runs dry and you are not able to be with the pump and tank to know when this happens and the pump runs dry? The other situation is that you have the float valve switch in your tank and when the level gets low every couple of days or so and when it kicks on the pump you have lost the prime sometimes and got trouble with the pump running dry? Tells us what is happening and someone here will help you solve your problem if it isn't an issue of having a poor water source in the well. Even that can be managed in a few ways. Choke dee and some more info will get you dialed in, otherwise maybe some permatex scissors a piece of gasket material spit and glue and you'll be set. Fords Filling Tanks Forever

SGD,

I have just been reviewing this, your thread, and find that I am guilty of diverting your intent. You have my apologies for appearing a time waster and a fool with an axe to grind. There are few things I dislike more. Sorry guys back to advising SGD. I'm out.

Isaan Aussie

At the crease for two days and you play the wrong ball the wrong way and your out, you can't take that last edge back. Nobody boos a batsman like that! Hey good buddy hold your bat high in the air and walk off the pitch and look at all the fans (for and against) in the eye. You deserve their respect and they deserve the same from you. Ford and Proud Forever

Hello All, this may give some info on food labels in LOS.

From the other Eng paper, today.

"Get picky with logos"

I assume the "Nation" and the wife says these are all government backed labels. Could someone help me with this so nothing is lost in the translation. Good on you fiver. Five Five Five and Fords Forever

Hey there name in a question how it is? The word out and about now is "niche" and I always equated it to "road-side stand" farming. The guys I've seen making it (that weren't guys that inherited 1/3 of grandpappy's 8700 acres of Sacramento Delta black bottom land) are able to fill (?) a "niche" in the market and it definitely seems to be where you can sell part of your crop at near retail prices. Is that going to be new cleaned rice or paddy you want to sell? If you have some small retail buyers now, hopefully you can get some more retail sales from them and possibly ask them to commit to some more purchases later on when you clean some more paddy. Restaurants may be a good place to try to get some small discounted retail purchase with the hope of larger future purchases if they find it is satisfactory or better than what they are currently using. You are looking to try to sell about 100 kilos a week for the next half year I would imagine, but I'm sure there are times when you wished you could sell it all one time and get a good price. We have a leased farm and the father-in-law needed cash so he sold off the entire farm shortly after harvest and we got 13.7 baht or something like that. It is Hom Mali but not in organic conversion like our other two farms but still at 13.7 you are miles from 17 guaranteed (you store it) that he got last year. The 3.3 baht difference is nearly 25% of your sale price and could be almost equal to 100% of your profits (yuk yuk in past years that could get close to just breaking even on your costs). We have never developed a market (retail or wholesale) for our rice and since there isn't any available (not yet) organizations in this area of Thailand (Burriram Dept of Ag a complete strike-out) to certify our 40 rai of farms as organic there are constraints we will need to resolve. All our rice is sold on the open market but tons of it is used for our extended family's consumption, trade and seed stock for planting our and other farms.

What this rambling is trying to say is sure you can sell all your rice next year all at once but you have the ability, with a very manageable 1500 kilos of stock, maybe to be able to look at alternatives to dumping all your stock if you can't get the price you want. The key to selling organic is to be certified. If so, then you will surely be in some form of a program that promotes "sustainability" as that is the essence of modern day organics. Anyone who is willing to put themselves through the three year process to certify is someone whose labeled product is going to hold much more faITH from consumers in the market (wait all you lunatics (yeah the knuckleheads who dern near say they'd eat human faeces before organic wowww) that will jump in and say there are no guarantees that this guy wouldn't spray his stuff with chems two days before harvesting to save the entire crop. There aren't, never will be, but it will be an extremely rare thing as the folks who certify generally are doing so as an economic decision, but just as importantly, as a "life-style" decision).

Oh yeah and that name thing i'd say "somewhere between mighty fine and getting better all the time''. Does that sound right? FFFFFFords FFFFForever

mkawish

He put 4 metal rods into the ground took a digital reading on a box (which I think had the name Aquarius on it) and then moved the outside pair of rods 10mtrs at a time until he got a low digital reading he then moved the rods outward some more and he just told me that the water extended 25mtrs one way and 36mtrs the other way he told me how many ltrs of water there was (which I have forgotten) and that I could run the pump for 3 days without stopping before I might loose any flow he seemed very confident about it not like the other driller that I have used that used divining rods

Lickey

I told the man that I would like 100mtrs, we are growing Thai vegetables (I do not know the names) on 11 Rai and I was hoping to use sprinklers on most of it in zones the pump is going to be a 1.5HP bore hole pump

Foreverford

I think that you are correct in saying that he is using other results from before by the way he picked the spot to try first he is also the first driller out of 3 that I have spoken to that told me that it was a 1.5HP pump the other 2 told me they would use a 1.5KW pump which should of have warned me any way I should know later today if he is correct

You may want to consider filling a tank or pond and then pumping from it with another pump to supply your irrigation system with enough pressure and volume to suffice on an 11 rai plot. Let the well pump run at its low volume and pressure for long durations of time and then boost the pressure and volume through another pump at ground level pumping from your storage supply. Wet Fords Forever

Organic food is grown without using chemical fertiliser like Nitrogen etc. They often replace the chemical fertiliser with raw human sewage so your fresh, organic veg has spent lots of its time in the field getting sprayed with sh@t.

Personally I'll stick to some nice " Clean " chemicals

ha ha ha you are a funny guy but a typical response from someone that is eating just what he needs. Good luck in your eloquent and enlightened world. Just for clarification as I'm sure you know, nitrogen is not a chemical it is an element. ha ha ha a yukka yuk yuk yuk Foolish Forever but not on a Ford

"Certified" organic is the key to finding what is truly organic. If a farm is "certified" then there is some organization that has certified that the farm has met international criteria AND has gone through the three year period it takes to become certified. In the days of old you could be chemical free (truly none, zero for one year) for a year and be certified. If the aphids hit you really hard one year you would bring out the chems kill them off sell your stuff to the non-organic market and then reapply for your certification again and wait your year and again would be certified. You can see why this had to be changed and was. So now it's three years to be certified and in Thailand it is rather difficult to do so in many instances. In Buriram their is noone that can certify our farm as the provincial dept of Ag has no method to do this. The next province over in Surin they have a very good certification proceedure that makes future members go to two weeks of intensive training and education to start their certification process and then there is annual required continuing education to stay certified with their orgnization. This is for rice only as I understand it and they won't let us join for their reasons which are legitimate.

Chemical free means nothing or maybe means what it says. It is chemical free for some period of time, an hour, a day, a week but in reality maybe never have been. The only way to get your best chance to find food truly "chemical free" is to try to find "certified" organic farm produce and then investigate each and every farm that you wish to buy from (at least in Thailand).

What may be even more relevant in the broader scope of things is to look at the term "sustainable". Many organizations will now not cetify growers if they are not sustainable,. In other words you can't buy an old plot of land that has never been farmed before (no residual chems) and plant casava on it for six years and destroy the soil by not amending it and get three years of certified organic production. With this example you can see hhow organic may not just mean chem free but chem free for a minumum of three years and sustainable methods that improve the soil and make it better than it was when it was first put into the process of getting its organic certification.

Hope this was helpful and managed to touch the tip of the iceberg that is the world of farming organically and sustainably. Fords Farming Forever

Most of the Thai well drillers will guarantee water and they are good for their guarantee as I have deduced from this forum and my own experience with our driller. A guarantee of the quantity he is claiming is, as said before, probably based on other water results from nearby wells. 170 is a lot of water and good for you if you have that amount of potential at such a shallow depth you should be very pleased. Just check this driller's past history with others in the area and you should be able to get a good feeling towards what he has to offer. choke Dee Fords in Fountains of Water Forever

I'll start off with rainfed rice, single crop per year.

Yield 520 kgs per rai. Average return after direct costs 4,500 baht per rai per year. Cost of land when purchased 20,000 baht per rai. Depreciation on equipment allocation per rai 2,500 baht pa.

IA

Same kind of rice crop. Our first year with 4 farms, the one organic conversion 14 rai plot yielded a bit less than I/A at about 475 kg per rai and profits at just over 4000 baht per rai with no factoring for depreciation or land costs and one time prep of land. The three other farms managed by my f-i-l at a total of near 55 rai saw us drop 290,000 baht due to old methods of production and chem costs.

You are going to get a lot of apples and oranges (different results based on methods, location and annual weather as being some of the many factors that will affect what appears to be the same crops). Fords a Flailin'

Yeah my pet rant is people not pissing their money away. From talking to other people travelling to Thailand the thoughts go, open a bar to open a hotel and then to open a farm because that is "real work".

I guess my "dark soul" saved me from opening the bar in pattaya , the cafe in bangkok, the hotel complex in samui or the farm in issan.

Boy is my face red.

Edit: I know you all had it tough. You used to 'ave to get up out of shoebox at twelve o'clock at night and lick road clean wit' tongue. You had two bits of cold gravel, worked twenty-four hours a day at mill for sixpence every four years, and when you got home our Dad would slice us in two wit' bread knife.

You have seen it all, we know.

Gee I guess this "pet" response is directed to me but like most of it before, it doesn't make too much sense. We all know in this Forum that we should be very appreciative of the people whose entire motive is to "save" us farmers or possible future farmers. Again sir I ask you to not ignore your ignorance. If you have read this thread and other similar ones that we have addressed in the past, most of us are doing exactly what you are saying in your mean, condescending and rude manner. We are trying to be informative and more times than not have directed most people to not to persue this type of "lifestyle" "business", without tons of research and time and observation before they ever sink one satang into a farming endeavor. Your previous posts show that you have either completely failed to see and understand this or in fact you really haven't even read it completely.

Hey I/A I'll still give you my money for all the piss that you process and blend from your farm it is sure making my carrots and tomatoes thrive. It is not getting away, you're an alchemist and have turned it into gold. Now ol' Jerry Jeff Walker had a great song he sang about "pissin' in the wind, and it's blowin' on all my friends making the same mistakes I swear I'll never make again" and maybe that is your theme song glomper guy but I think that is exactly why we have this forum to try to help ourselves and others from making this their song through the exchange of "hands on" experience and "know how" and successes and failures. Good ol' Jerry in later years added a line (never be satisfied always try to make it better) to end of this great song and he said "The way I see it now it's like trading buffalo chips for micro-chips." Fords and Buffalo Chips Forever

Well I suppose Jim and I will have to just accept our second class status, grin and bear It. This book has a pretty ragged cover after all so your call is fair enough.

But I will ask you to note and forgive a few petty exceptions I take to your comments. Mine is not a life style farm, its a <deleted> Hard Work Farm. I live the life I choose, but it is hardly in style! I would like to mention that you show little trust in those around you. That's a shame.

Good luck with your corporate endeavours I hope you do well. I know I did, and I know those I worked for did even better. I also know I enjoyed it.

But for me those "CP" days are past Game, Set and Match Point, the hair has worn off the ball. It isnt about feeding the world, changing or controlling it, or owning more of it. As Jim said, food on the table and a few beers is enough reward. If that means selling, or eating my own kidneys then so be it I suppose. Needs are as needs must.

I will finish with a personal observation. Rural Thailand is riddled with petty jealousy, winners and losers, its frustrating and an absolute and utter waste of time. I tell my wife, If you dont want to lose then dont play. When I was taught to play cricket, I learnt its the good balls you must play, let the bad ones go through to the Keeper.

So continue to defend your stumps my friend!

Isaan Aussie

Well Mr Glomp with the pomp and some ceremony what say you to the I/A style of life. You aren't being very much, in, in the, in part, of informative.

"If you need to get 3-4 million baths each year you have invested a fair chunk of change and are not easily mobile.......Farmers in this forum complain about low returns, to get 3mill you would have to produce something incredibly high yield to limit the input capital to something manageable. If it's a 3-4% return we are looking at it would make much more sense to put the capital in the bank and buy a small farm for the farming lifestyle and do it for some extra beer money."..."Edit: IA we are talking about different issues a bit, you are talking about the quality of life style farm. The op and me are talking about starting a large farming corp from the start. This will probably not be taking it easy in your golden years. Not owning your land and living like a second class citizen would give me an ulcer. "

I really don't think you really understand what has been said in this particular post and that has led to your ignorance (note the use of "ignorance"; for non-English speakers that doesn't mean anything like foolish, vain and plain rude, it means you are just unknowledgeable and haven't been informed yet). Right from the front I explained to SGD If you need to get 3-4 million baht each year (I figured a little less than 3-4% because nowdays that isn't an easy "bank" "secured" investment for the amount of money involved) it would take 100-200 million and he said he wasn't into that game so we started to change the way we tried to inform him of other possibilities in today's market. It remained rather civil until recently as we who have to go into town covered in over-alls, dusty clothes, oily fingernails, you pick the one you want to use, because we need something NOW and if we don't get it, we will ended up taking serious loses. This is the way I've seen it my whole life. the farmer lives his life right out in front on his sleeve and has no time to be pretentious because it is just too much work and the thing a farmer doesn't need is more work. So other than a few digs you don't really have any new information to add. I explained to SGD he would need to hire the half a dozen administrative folks to run his 100-200 million corp and he didn't want that "lifestyle" so it appears you just jumped into the middle of this intelligent (another word with the "in" that folks that are dialed in try to use) discussion to throw out a pet rant and get rid of some pent up tensions that may be based on your corporate defeatist type of view. Or is it style? As the Dead said in "The New Speedway Boogie" "Please don't dominate the rap Jack if you got nothing new to say.." we heard all your "rap" before it ain't new and it's not that pertinent to this discussion. What a waste of time to put all that down in words but it's hard to have someone call your soul ugly and I didn't have to read between the lines to affronted by it.

Hey I/A I got to go ain't got no more time for this stuff as i was going to really lay down a great "Down on the Farm" this morn but now n o tim e but it had Stevie Ray vaughn Quincy Jones and BB King in it and I know they enjoyed and enjoy their lifestyle and feel yours and many other farmers similar to you are truly admirable as i do to. Now with "Sixes" it's a different game just like this post sometimes you have to take the bad balls and do something with them as you only get six deliveries. Since my first fourth ball of this over wasn't a yorker and i got a glomper I decide to step up and take full on and play it straight up the wicket right at the bowler. yeah the Irish remind of farmers. Now how diod that last result turn out with the mighty English? Fords and Googlies Forever

Different seed? No no no, Forever no. What we got here is a failure to communicate, me Ol' Cool Hand Luke mate! What we got here is fungal compost, nature's way of innoculating seed. Natures way of saying WAKE UP, grow you SOB (seeds-of-bangkok). Microbes my man! The good guys. Living soil. Brown Gold, Texas Teal Mr Clampett. What we got here is good Ol' Fashioned PIG sh1t, carbonised rice hulls to release all those trapped nutrients, all mixed by pitchfork and delivered with a smile.

Hey cool you call me the fool? How do you think I'm going to get anymore of that magic dust if i keep singing your praises regarding the oils of your snakes; give me Dino the brakes. Hey good buddy what it is? Freezing in the sunshine state and I refuse to even step out into it. Looking to stuff the Ford again with your oil but cricket and water splashing will dictate when. Like the saying goes better to look the fool than open the mouth and remove all doubt (orr something like that), now guys like me never learned from those sayings. Fords Full of Carrots Forever

my spanish is way closer to grand zero, probably even my thai is better. so, suggest we return to English

soidog2, thank you for clearning up some things.

as for family and thai ways and control goes, once some yrs back we tried a restaurant with wifey, and thought i saw breakeven results due the lack of understanding cost control from the staff, or my wife to enforce ways i thought her. Even she had 15+ yrs work experience, she wasnt on management side.

but i think we can learn together, it is farming she likes more, being a village girl at core i guess, as she enjoys a lot our little hobby garden as well around the house where we stay now.

slowly some ideas coming together in my head as well, the trickier part will be to turn them into action, of course, as let say it is one thing that i think to try 2 rais of cassava, along other things, the other is to get locally someone who understands what needs to be done with the land to preparation, or find where to buy the plants to start with, and finally the place to sell to of course...

right now the main idea will go along that direction of trying multiple things, what i think should be something like 3 bigger something, like 2-2-2 rai rice, corn and cassava for example, and another 2 rai divided to food for eat sort of trials, like 1/2 rai each of chili, carrot, onion and tomato for example.

but just thinking "aloud" here yet.

there was sure some good answer, i am doing more reading as well, then will work out even a more final plan.

i think i will have to be bookeeper, wife being difficulty like most thai to do even basic calculations without a calculator at hand.

"and another 2 rai divided to food for eat sort of trials, like 1/2 rai each of chili, carrot, onion and tomato for example.

but just thinking "aloud" here yet." I would suggest, if possible, to try to plant very very small plots of your vegetables including the corn especially if you have the village family's home (with water). 5-10 square meters of any of the above and corn is a good start and with the intensity (a lot of time and care) of having the small plots you can get a feel for growing in the tropics and hopefully be successful. My wife's first small plot of carrots got zero germination. Her next attempt appears to be a success. Seed? Issan Aussie's compost? Don't know yet but we will continue to look at the different factors and hopefully learn. The casava and rice in larger plots is more better yeah. Be cool and choke dee with no more Spanish for you and me. a Forever Ford For Food and Fun

though it was very obvious from previous posts that i am not native English, and sure it is a struggle to comprehend some of the words without a dictionary with me, not to mention that even some i wouldnt know the name probably on my own language neither! but i am here to learn, that i can do!

yes, i heard this try many things on very small scale, only was thinking that if too many things there, non will be real accurately judged between real and chance of final results.

but certainly this farming would have a minimum 4 yrs trial time from me, if we move i wont plan to go anywhere before that 4 yrs is up, and once there, why not keep trying...thus i dont plan the thing for a one time gig, and run if not working out from day1 on.

got some useful asnwers already, and really appriciate all the contributions.

Hi there tingtong. Nothing wrong using the 'ole word book to manage some new languages. Nobody are rocket scientists whilst learning a foreign language. It'll seep in all the time. Myselft I'm struggling with the basics of spanish.

Puro perfecto con un dictionario o otro libros Ud va a apprender alguna lengua, La cosa es no tiene el miedo. Andale pues otra vez, yo se es muy dificil a entender mis disertaciones y El Pero del Soi es correcto quando dice mi "format" (solo un parrafo y muchas otras cosas pocas incorrectas) en veces es dificil a entender pero es un estilo me gusta mucha y con esta es la manera de la vida buena y otra vez andale pues. Con Tractores Ford Vamanos Pues. (es muy facil a saber yo no soy trabajando ahorita y tengo mucho tiempo libre a escribir cosas pocas locas)

Oregano and sage seem to do OK in big pots. The oregano takes full sun. The sage is coming to an end now but lasted a good year. Different basils do OK but do go to seed fairly quickly. No joy with all the types of parsley, chervil, dill and thyme. An Australian aunt told me the best way to grow parsley was in a pot in the kitchen so I may try that next. BTW the oregano went woody and died back a few months ago but returned with new shoots and is now as good as ever.

My Dill does very well, if you want some acclimatized seeds let me know

peter

just starting on the herb garden and along with others mentioned have had good luck with sweet marjoram and Italian parsley. Fragrance and Fords Forever

always good to say where you are located but I'll travel a good distance to find good stock

was asing rice in a sack as it was written that way.

+ believe it or not English is about as far from my native language as it gets, and was not much in the studies about thai or general farming therm

so, even those are something i am learning/trying to figure while reasing some threads back.

anyway, slowly some more solid idea is forming, as said before i expect little but hope not to lose money, the rest will work out from there.

thanks for correcting things a bit.

good on you ol tonger of tings good view on the thing. too too tough that you aren't an English native language guy as this forum would be near impossible to grasp fully without it being your native tongue but it appears you have a good communicative ability in the language and that is good. Evryone will know how to be able to respond to you now and not use words like supercalifragilisticexpealidosious (could never stand Julie Andrews). This forum is then the perfect avenue for you to find out some things rather easily. the point of the rice bag parable is that farming is very complex but if you are looking at break even farming and not losing money type of farming then i think you stand an extremely good chance of doing so. Number one is to be diversified. Grow and raise everything that you would normally buy at the market for a start. Do it on a very very small scale to start to see what you can be successful with and don't give up the first try with others that you aren't. Try to stay 100% organic in almost all of your farming (livestock will make this a bit difficult in the beginning) at least with your plant and the soil. Almost no excuse not to be. you are putting it your body. try to find I/A's niche product in your area (the thing that eliminates middle man and also is unique to you and what others want, hopefully nearby). folow this forum diligently get what you can from past posts and always feel free to ask well thoguht and researched questions to the many that wil be there to help you as it is the way of farmers. Farmers and Fords Forever

Isaan Aussi,

Thanks for that. I remember reading through your posts with awe and admiration but I am not coming at this from the same perspective as you. If I have understood correctly, you work very hard and all hours to maximise the yield from your land space, generating way more than a Thai would from the same plot. However, I'm not sure I'm into vertical integration and I know I'm not into animals. At a push, growing something under the shade of something else is where I stand or more likely, using technology or another input to produce more or of a better quality. My hands remaining dirt free for the main as well.

The idea of having to develop a market is also not really on my agenda. If you already have your lot so to speak then I fully understand that you need to develop more markets. Going into it and having to develop a market is too risky. That said, your idea of a move to a more sustainable future is obvious but whether it can be achieved and sustainable at a micro / semi micro level remains to be seen. Something to think about though.

Gary A

I don't buy into your " if you have the investment money available to make 3 million baht per year, you already have enough to retire on" argument nor the pessimism that anything to do with farming needs to be subsistence only. In fact, your argument would seem to disprove itself in that once you move past the volumes required to subsist, then you have all the remainder available to sell.

I am under no illusion that a land based business needs a lot more thought and a very well developed business plan to generate the required income, which may well prove impossible, but that does not mean chucking in the towel before starting the thought process. Careful I am, defeatist I am not.

One thing I see is the huge problem of getting your product to market and the fact that so many farmers get shafted by the middle men. I would need variations on the standard route to market as I would never be beholding to someone having so much power over me. Then again, for some crops, there may be a derivatives market for hedging ?

My gut feeling is to devote the majority of the land to something stable and then be more esoteric with the rest. What, I do not yet know !

Well done G of DS or variations thereof. Nice response as I said before I think folks needed to see where you are coming from and you have made it very clear in your post now. It appears you are trying to get something and are realistic in assessing what you want and will do to be able to try to reach your goal. Is there something out there that you can do, who knows? It is a bit like the Thai pharmacy though I think, you have a guy put up a pharmacy and it thrives at its location after a year someone notices it is successful and he puts up another across the street. they are both able to survive somewhat and then the next year two more go up a half a block away and nobody is doing well anymore. the best may be able to make a decent living, maybe. I've never seen a nation with so many abandoned businesses (kanom shops on the highway in Petchburi) wall to wall. So we await your views and decisions and wish you success in whatever you decide and of course the biggest compliment that we could give you, as always, would be imitation so please make us all rich and sooner than later. for me I wil follow the I/A example because in my short and delusional life it is the only way I have ever been able to figure out how to be successful and create some good income. If you are not willing to put in some 20 and 32 hour days then i don't think you will ever be able to feel assured that you will have some form of success. sort of like when you don't have your own business the only way I could figure how to get ahead in the race of rats was to work two jobs a day, that is when you can start banking some cash to try to getit together to buy yur own farm or make a business. A good plan, hard work, harder studying, constantly questioning and assessing and, as I/A puts it, finding a "niche" (or, if not, just plain being the best at what you do ) is really what it is all about, the situation with farming is that it is so complex that it seems to magnify all these to just another level. a Ford For a Ford Forever

We have some land and one piece happens to be 8 rai.

I will try to give you an intelligent answer you can use.

On our 8 rai we grow cassava; this year, because of unusually high prices we managed to bring in more than 100.000.00 Baht net profit.

Usually the profit is much lower; we work just as hard.

We also have a piece that's 9 rai, there only rice can be grown and only once a year.

Last year's crop we got about 40 sacks without trying too hard. ( min. Baht, 1000.00 per sack )

There is a learning curve to anything, unless your wife's family are successful farmers and willing to help you; be prepared for zero profit or small losses in your first couple of years.

Life in the country is not for everyone, if you like the freedom that comes with it and are capable of being completely self sufficient; go for it.

Good luck !

thanks soidog2, indeed a very informative ( and intelligent) post!

i am prepared to see no profit for 1-2 yrs, and definately no making a living from 8 rai...

thus i will keep my current job to make the financial ends meet, and leave farming to wifey.

her brother has around 30 rai of rice, 1 crop a yr only, might be able to help with some advice, but judging from the visible income, not with how to hit it home...as many mentioned thais seem to be happy with little, or often lack the incentive to have more, or work hard for something.

anyway, would like to ask that your figures, the net profit that is, what labor or mashine cost is factored into? do you work with your own, or pay for a rent/fee per rai? cassava seem to yield a better profit, is the initial start up cost also correspond to this, ie 2x of the ricefield's? Is there any special thing about cassava, let say that restrict it to some areas?

in the case of the rice, that 40 sacks equal to about how many kg of rice?

sorry, some newbie questions, i am as well reading up the forum, and some answers might be there, but i havent yet find them then.

thanks again!

It's funny how free so many people are willing to try to inform a newbie, as it is, about farming. If you weren't a newbie you would understand the general feel of their responses but here goes... A sack of rice doesn't have any rice in it at all, it haS "paddy" in it. Semantics, but important in farming because there is so little room for error unless profits are to be abandoned and you are just trying to entertain yourself or occupy your time. Generally we can get close tio 100 kilos of "new" paddy in our sacks as the in-laws will stuff the sacks to the bitter end to Assure that they can't get a single grain more into the sack then they will hand stich it closed as it looks like it is ready to explode ( the reason, I figure, is that at times the bag isd dern near worth more than the paddy). New paddy weighs more than dried paddy and is worth less due to its high moisture content. there will be times when the bags will need to be un stiched and unfilled and the paddy spread out to dry (this year) as the only time available to harvest requires you to take it out before it is properly dry and it is tons more labor ($) to deal with it. How much does a bag of rice weigh? who knows if I was buying paddy I'd say 86 kilos (and hopefully with the proper moisture content) the seller would be saying it is at least 95 so that is what they weigh, until you get a scale (tested??) ans qweigh it and then assess the moisture. So many factors all the time and always changing and never stop learning and looking but all these queations you have have been addressed before, but at times would be a bit difficult to find for you as the posts take on different directions than the posting title. It's definitely an experience thing, if you had been reading tthis forum for five uyears and not even been farming you would have a wealth of experien ce and knowledge even if you had never turned over a bit of earth. Keep looking keep reading keep learning. Keep on keeping on and on, on a Ford tractor Forever

The best advice I think you will get is to try to spend about a dozen hours or more and read many of the topics that have been already written on your various questions. Right now Jim has been explaining that 100k is what you are looking at to get producing rubber rais and it appears he feels you can get it for less. Small plots will always tend to be a bit more expensive per rai. there are many topics that will help you understand the title and it's classification will dictate the value also. Do some homework and study this site for a week or so and then come back with some new questions as you will end up finding many more places for sale as soon as word gets out that a gringo is around and wanting to buy land. Choke dee keep looking reading and learning as most of what you are asking right now is available to you by looking at the old postings that we have here at your disposal. "Goin' to buy me a Mercury and cruise on down the road"

"So gotta lost it is off to Tak to record the largest, a 700+ year older, sounds like fun. I guess I'm the proud owner of a couple dozen 'carps as I'm darn near deaf and couldn't really make out the Thai name of a tree Fruity has growing at his place but now teung was what it sounded like to me. I hope to get about 100 more after Songkran."

I wrote this before but "teung" it wasn't; the name, as well as I can hear it, sounds like tah kuu. Does anyone recognize what this might be? It grows extremely fast and very straight with no large lateral branches forking off and is supposed to be an excellent hard wood good for lumber (the purpose of planting them). Hey Doc Lover of Trees do you know? Also I think I remember reading something from Normita in the Bangkok Post saying something about you maybe leaving Thailand a while back or some such somethang. Are you still here with us in the LOS?

Hey dipto one, ya got to love those photos you put up. The http://www.sjonhause...pterocarps.html talks about one 700 year old in Tak but that island beauty of yours is going to be fun searching out. this is turning out to be too cool. Dipts as the link says are considered "rubber" trees by the locals and were tapped for the resin for assorted uses such as wood sealing for boats and lighting oil. Locals call the family of trees "teung" a rather common botanical word that who knows what inflection of the pronunciation will refer to what. Saying it one way it's a dipterocarp but another change in the tone of your delivery and you're saying something not too nice about your in-laws aunt's right foot baby toenail during a beautiful sunset. The link is a good one but can easily be overwelming for non native English speakers but a good read for all if you've the time.

Looking at your photo and thinking of the criteria of measuring at 1.2 meters high (sort of belly button high) If you used a piece 1/4" polypropolyene rope and worked it around the tree with three people to hold it and pulled it tight you would get a certain circumfrance of say 20 meters just for example. But if one or two people went around that tree and were to use that same rope as you would a flat "tailor's or seamstress' " tape measure (as if you wanted to shroud the object with a piece of cloth completely around) you would end up having a measurement when going along the contour of the trunk of the tree that could possibly reach 25 meters, The question is, What is the proper way to measure the circumfrence (and spell the dang word)? What do you say there Burger of the Brahma? Figuring on a Ford Forever

If you are talking dryland tillage, the choice between a ford and a kubota is like deciding between death and taxes. not sure which one is which, but neither very attractive. a john deere is a real tillage tractor. fords are expensive on fuel, and made to be a general purpose or dairy tractor. kubotas aren't expensive to operate. you can't "justify" the cost of a tractor on that size of operation based on field use alone, it's true, but if you must hire the work, you're at the mercy of somebody else's sched. and if they can't show up when you need them, that can cost. you could hire the tillage and get a smaller general purpose tractor, say 35hp 4wd, and get a rotovator for a market/personal garden, a spray rig and rotary mower for weed control, a front loader bucket ( no end to what you can do with that, pull an engine, pound in fence posts, dig a pond, etc.), and a back blade for smoothing out farm roads. of course a hilling attachment for the back so you an hill your own crop. this way you can get a lot of hours of useful work out of a cheaper tractor. maybe pick up a used kubota for a 200,000b or so at auction with a tiller and add the implements you need. ohh, i recommend buying a tiller with a changeable gear box. most of the tillers sold in thailand are for paddy cultivation and run the tines at too slow a speed relative to tractor ground speed, even in first gear, to do a good job on dryland jobs. the deere dealers sell an italian made tiller that has a slow or a fast tine speed.

btw, i've owned operated:kubota, john deere, massey fergeson, international, case, and mineapolis moline. that old 35hp gas case that sat out in the cow shit would always pull the ford 5000 out of the mud, even with a fully loaded green chop wagon full of wet grass.

the kubota has two speeds on the pto box,i know its relative to ground speed but i made pretty short work of some really lumpy hard soil the other day and i was running in second gear low box

and i agree there is always better tractors but i have a kubota and its only 2yrs old

we also use it for getting into properties in the village to bring up the land and level it out under the houses

hey, i like kubotas! correct me if i'm wrong, but isn't the faster speed on the pto about a 25% increase? what i was referring to amounts to a full doubling of tine speed at the same shaft input speed. that makes it possible to go to full depth in dry soil in a single pass if you use bottom gear. if you haven't already bought a tiller, it's well worth the extra money/effort to get one with changeable ratios. the one i had just had a cover plate that one removed then exchange the positions of the larger and smaller gear.

yes the box if 540 and 750 speed

Now you guys is shakin me up. Especially when talking about rear tined "walk behinds". I'm the big fan of "no-Plough" farming and like to keep hearing those highway sounds and keep moving in sixth (maybe a proof of your belief island man that Fords fly (and still keep you in the seat) but drop down a gear or two and the Deere's can move tectonic plates). I had some sweet soil in Monterey and could get that Ford and an Italian Gearmore (a Howard knock-off) to make the ground fluff up like whipped cream; dam_n near too soft ( I was limited because the tiller was only a one speed) for some things, a two speed is the only way to go. Rotovator coined by Howard of Australia is in fact the longest woid you can spell the same forward and backward. I have a 2.3 meter that was made in Malaysia under Howard Australia subsidiary or such with no Howard markings and opted for the "Buffalo" model which is the beefed up "Thai" model that I think they feel they needed to build to deal with the Thai philosophy towards the operation of "disposable equipment". Haven't been fortunate enough to use it much as I'm trying to envigorate some rough shod clay on the main farm and have been discing crop after crop of sun hemp into it between rice and constant grading, but it is some tough stuff on the tiller, you've got to get the moisture just right to work it right. Same method of gearing with these models as your Kubotas (obviously they would copy Howard as most smart and good manufacturers would) you change the configuration of the four gears in the box above the differential. Soil and moisture are critical in deciding your gearing as you'll never move my thing in sixth gear (well now I haven't actually done that ...and what if you are going downhill and it's Aromas Sand soil that has 3 week old rotted fava bean green manure discd deep and it's just rained 2" in the last 5 days and 85 horse Ford and a 2 meter "buffalo? ...nah not with a rotovator. I always get the funny feeling that if somwbody has never spun one of those for a few days and got some experience they could end up stickin the dern thing in the ground and all you would see until his tractor run out of fuel is the tractor pointing straight up in the air and spinnning around like a sprinkler with the operator singing Glory Hallelouyah, Wow the things the mind can conjure when your 14 hours on a tractor with the lights still working and fuel in the tank) but get it in third or even fourth with high rev's and you will make sandy soil possibly too soft to be able to use properly in some applications. Moisture and a bunch of 6th gear discing will definitely take a load off of all the equipment and allow you to easier dial in your gearing on both. Well surfer bra and Andy twenty and a dime, good luck with all. Hey soif buddy why not start up a new thread in regards to what is the current state of the availability of walk behinds in Southeast Asia. Choke Dee and some Power Grading with a Ford and a Rodeeeo Tiller

If you are talking dryland tillage, the choice between a ford and a kubota is like deciding between death and taxes. not sure which one is which, but neither very attractive. a john deere is a real tillage tractor. fords are expensive on fuel, and made to be a general purpose or dairy tractor. kubotas aren't expensive to operate. you can't "justify" the cost of a tractor on that size of operation based on field use alone, it's true, but if you must hire the work, you're at the mercy of somebody else's sched. and if they can't show up when you need them, that can cost. you could hire the tillage and get a smaller general purpose tractor, say 35hp 4wd, and get a rotovator for a market/personal garden, a spray rig and rotary mower for weed control, a front loader bucket ( no end to what you can do with that, pull an engine, pound in fence posts, dig a pond, etc.), and a back blade for smoothing out farm roads. of course a hilling attachment for the back so you an hill your own crop. this way you can get a lot of hours of useful work out of a cheaper tractor. maybe pick up a used kubota for a 200,000b or so at auction with a tiller and add the implements you need. ohh, i recommend buying a tiller with a changeable gear box. most of the tillers sold in thailand are for paddy cultivation and run the tines at too slow a speed relative to tractor ground speed, even in first gear, to do a good job on dryland jobs. the deere dealers sell an italian made tiller that has a slow or a fast tine speed.

btw, i've owned operated:kubota, john deere, massey fergeson, international, case, and mineapolis moline. that old 35hp gas case that sat out in the cow shit would always pull the ford 5000 out of the mud, even with a fully loaded green chop wagon full of wet grass.

Well kum wanna wanna lei scoop em bra and whatever other hawaiian gibberish I can manage, welcome the case for Case by a man of many tractors. John Deere has to be the only choice for a new purchases as I see it. I think it came out to about 300,000 baht ($10,000 US) each for about a half dozen 60 HP 2WD stripped down tractors that were bought new about a little over 8 years ago in California. I'm In the market for a big (2.3+ meter) rotary mower for the Ford if you find any in your journeys (where are you located) and I've got a new "seven" that I'd like to be rid of. From Fords in Front & Behind Cases Away