When I was in Isaan last year I saw a few farmers using a sugar harvester to collect their sugar cane crop to take to market. I saw a lot of farmers burning their sugar cane crop because they either couldn't afford the price to rent a harvester or their weren't enough machine harvesters to go around. It got me wondering since burning causes a lot of thick black smoke to spew into the air, why doesn't the government invest in some more harvesters for the farmers to cut down on all the acrid smoke from billowing into the sky and causing more pollution. The government says they want to address the burning which is causing a lot of serious pollution so why wouldn't they invest in some more machine harvesters for the farmers to significantly cut down on all the burning? I would like to think if the government can afford to purchase some very expensive military hardware that they could also afford to buy some more harvesters? Is  this wishful thinking on my part?

Don't think the government will be buying anytime soon.

Usually the sugar factories have Preferred contractors to do this,a lot depends on volume of work in the area and how clean your land is eg rocks and tree stumps.

You do get priority to unload if cut into billets compared to wholestalk.

The thing is even if you cut by hand you don't need to burn.

Just run a slasher down the rows to break down the trash,that's all we used to do.

Famerjo is right, no government will be buying sugar cane harvesters ,if they did  rice corn farmers will be wanting combines to harvest they crops ,when will it end.if they did who would do the maintenance, transport the machines ,pay wages ect  a logistical headache. 

And the cost one second hand imported machine can be up to 3 million baht not cheap ,in our area they are a good few machines ,I hear all the time from farmers "i am waiting for a machine to cut my crop ,it should have been here last week ",as a lot of machine's  owners are owned by big growers ,who will cut they own crop before doing Somchie's and neighbor's  20rie ,hence the wait ,they are  now maybe one, two machines owned by  our local's  mill manager who contracts them out .

The main reason for burning the crop ,is to make life easier for the cutters ,they get payed by piece work ,they can make a lot more money cutting a burnt crop than an unburnt crop ,and cutters are getting more and more difficult to find ,so machine cutting will becoming more common soon,but as FJ said mills give priority tipping to machine cut cane ,I have heard because as the cane is in billets it drys out quicker ?so the sugar % is less ,so the farmer will receive less money .

Anyway in this area it will be a poor harvest no rain crop yields will be down about 30% ,one grower said the local mill/government will be subsidizing the crop 50  baht/ton ,we shall see.