Rubber planters plan protest over govt failure to tackle falling prices

By The Nation

 

 

Rubber planters in Nakhon Si Thammarat province are planning a protest on Tuesday (January 7) over the government's failure to solve the problem of declining rubber prices.

 

On Sunday (January 5), Manat Boonphat, president of the Rubber Tapping Association and Small Rubber Planters, said their meeting had discussed their problems and the government's failure to shore up the price of rubber, which has fallen for 7-8 years. He said the government continued to neglect them as a result rubber buyers were able to take advantage of the planters.

 

The Association of Rubber Tappers and Small Rubber Planters and the Alliance Rubber Planters Institute has organised a forum to listen to the opinions of people in this business. They will protest against being exploited by a trade group and a rubber export company from 1.30pm onwards at Ban Huai Prik chicken-fighting field, in Huai Prik Subdistrict, in the Chawang district of Nakhon Si Thammarat.

 

"We will highlight the government's failure to help rubber planters who have endured a downturn in prices for 7-8 years," said Manat. "We are expecting many people to turn out. This will be an open platform for everyone to come and discuss the issues until they reach a conclusion," Manat added.

 

Source: https://www.nationthailand.com/news/30380188

 

-- © Copyright The Nation Thailand 2020-01-06

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it wasn't all that long ago rubber farmers were lining up to buy new pick-ups and the buzz word was buy land and plant rubber trees

 

Join the long queue of all the other farmers..............

But ....but ....we flocked to the ' Shutdown Bangkok ' protests to help you oust the democratically elected government !! You said you would look after our interests. We feel betrayed !!

 

Suckers.

Seen this morning, on the roadside in my province Sakon Nakhon:
16 ..
So 16 baht one kg of raw balls ..
I wonder what is the real profit of a planter, even if he is an owner;

if it is a metayer, he will be entitled to 8 baht per kg;
as far as he goes to the city look for a new job..

 

Ten years ago the price was 80 baht for 1 kg of raw balls 

Some farmers planted rubber trees and earned a lot of money. Many other farmers saw this and thought "wow, I need to plant rubber trees". Surprisingly the market reaction is: larger offer - lower prices. And not only in Thailand, in the whole world. But Thais will never understand.

They obviously don't understand the concept of supply & demand, toooooo mut lubber no good Somchai, same with all the other farmers around the country, blame the gubberment and demand that they shore up prices for their own greed.

They still think Thailand runs the world and it’s markets.  Too bad they can tell them they don’t because they propagated the lie ????

I collect bandai toys - sell it cheap to bandai to reduce my costs please. thank you

typical thai farmers, they want to be part of the world market but want the country to pay them extra when the prices drop from over production, way past time the govt said no to doing it and made them accept the blame themselves due to their greed, they are the ones that planted all the trees and now they are reaping the results, lower prices due to over production

27 minutes ago, Assurancetourix said:

Seen this morning, on the roadside in my province Sakon Nakhon:
16 ..
So 16 baht one kg of raw balls ..
I wonder what is the real profit of a planter, even if he is an owner;

if it is a metayer, he will be entitled to 8 baht per kg;
as far as he goes to the city look for a new job..

 

Ten years ago the price was 80 baht for 1 kg of raw balls 

Fresh tapped rubber is priced about 38 baht/kilo today. Not sure what you mean with "raw balls", has to be "kee yang", these are the leftovers.

45 minutes ago, Denim said:

But ....but ....we flocked to the ' Shutdown Bangkok ' protests to help you oust the democratically elected government !! You said you would look after our interests. We feel betrayed !!

 

Suckers.

Ahhh... such are the vagaries of politics.

 

And Suthep. Put your wine in cracked bottle and this is what happens...

 

 

7 minutes ago, seajae said:

typical thai farmers, they want to be part of the world market but want the country to pay them extra when the prices drop from over production, way past time the govt said no to doing it and made them accept the blame themselves due to their greed, they are the ones that planted all the trees and now they are reaping the results, lower prices due to over production

Some of our neighbours had their trees planted 50 years ago..

These guys look more and more like French farmers. Wonder why I came here.

17 minutes ago, swissbie said:

Some of our neighbours had their trees planted 50 years ago..

I have researched rubber trees and their production life is an average of 20 years the experts say, after that very little to no production.  Can anyone else site a reputable source for this?  

Also, many buggy whip factories were put out of biz when autos became affordable, should the governments of the affected nations have prop. them up?

7 hours ago, webfact said:

Rubber planters plan protest over govt failure to tackle falling prices

The market dictates the price of rubber not the Thai government..

3 hours ago, swissbie said:

Fresh tapped rubber is priced about 38 baht/kilo today. Not sure what you mean with "raw balls", has to be "kee yang", these are the leftovers.

I don´t know what you mean with "fresh tapped rubber"...You can make matts,but they are anything but fresh.To make matts,which is a lot of work,you have to hang them to dry out;to loose as much water as possible.That takes time.The price is about dubbel that of cuprubber,but the weight is about the half,so it comes to about the same result moneywise. Cuprubber is what many (most?) farmers do.You cut the trees for about 8-10 times.Everytime the latex drips down in a cup,and when it`s about full,you collect and sell.Nothing fresh here...Actually,nobody want to buy the rubber if it too fresh.(lots of water)   Your other post,about 50 year old trees;well,perhaps they are that old.But they are not giving any latex.About 30 years is the maximum for meaningful tapping.

1 hour ago, Bosse137 said:

I don´t know what you mean with "fresh tapped rubber"...You can make matts,but they are anything but fresh.To make matts,which is a lot of work,you have to hang them to dry out;to loose as much water as possible.That takes time.The price is about dubbel that of cuprubber,but the weight is about the half,so it comes to about the same result moneywise. Cuprubber is what many (most?) farmers do.You cut the trees for about 8-10 times.Everytime the latex drips down in a cup,and when it`s about full,you collect and sell.Nothing fresh here...Actually,nobody want to buy the rubber if it too fresh.(lots of water)   Your other post,about 50 year old trees;well,perhaps they are that old.But they are not giving any latex.About 30 years is the maximum for meaningful tapping.

think he means fresh sap, we have a friend that pays for the liquid state of rubber, the tappers bring it in containers & he tests it to see how much water is in it then weighs it and works out the price, they put it into a big tank on a truck then take it too the rubber factory. Has a better price than set rubber as it doesnt have to be treated to be useful

Edited January 6, 20206 yr by seajae

33 minutes ago, seajae said:

think he means fresh sap, we have a friend that pays for the liquid state of rubber, the tappers bring it in containers & he tests it to see how much water is in it then weighs it and works out the price, they put it into a big tank on a truck then take it too the rubber factory. Has a better price than set rubber as it doesnt have to be treated to be useful

Yes, that's what i mean. It's what they are doing all around here.

1 hour ago, Bosse137 said:

I don´t know what you mean with "fresh tapped rubber"...You can make matts,but they are anything but fresh.To make matts,which is a lot of work,you have to hang them to dry out;to loose as much water as possible.That takes time.The price is about dubbel that of cuprubber,but the weight is about the half,so it comes to about the same result moneywise. Cuprubber is what many (most?) farmers do.You cut the trees for about 8-10 times.Everytime the latex drips down in a cup,and when it`s about full,you collect and sell.Nothing fresh here...Actually,nobody want to buy the rubber if it too fresh.(lots of water)   Your other post,about 50 year old trees;well,perhaps they are that old.But they are not giving any latex.About 30 years is the maximum for meaningful tapping.

No, rubber trees are good for 20 - 30 years, but they plant new ones all the time, in between the lines of the old ones. What i meant is in NE and North they started to plant rubber trees when prices skyrocketed, but here down south they had been doing this for a long time already.

3 hours ago, hotchilli said:

The market dictates the price of rubber not the Thai government..

 

But government policies and propaganda encouraged the farmers to plant more rubber (and rice) to increase exports.  It's easy to blame the farmers, but if you track down the reason for the oversupply, it's the government programs. 

 

And if I were a betting man, I'd bet the middlemen are doing fine as the farmers are struggling.  That's another Thai phenomena...  The well connected middlemen make all the money.  Whether it's rice, rubber, or lumber.

 

55 minutes ago, swissbie said:

Yes, that's what i mean. It's what they are doing all around here.

This was tried where I live too,but people found out,that after the weight of the watercontent was withdrawn,the price was not better than it was for cuprubber.So nowadays everybody works with cuprubber.

49 minutes ago, swissbie said:

No, rubber trees are good for 20 - 30 years, but they plant new ones all the time, in between the lines of the old ones. What i meant is in NE and North they started to plant rubber trees when prices skyrocketed, but here down south they had been doing this for a long time already.

If you plant new trees betwen the old ones,it does not work;they get suffocated so to speak.There is a good reason for keeping ca 7 meter between the rows.Perhaps you mean AFTER,they took down the old trees.Then they have to wait 5-7 years for the new ones to be ready for tapping. BTW,we planted our trees in good time before the boom,I am happy to say. But too late to get the plants for free....

When i came here to live 9 years ago, i looked for suitable crops to boost the family income. I looked at rubber, but one days research was enough to tell me that there was a massive acreage of trees throughout SE Asia (not just Thailand) which had been planted but not yet ready for tapping.The current result was utterly predictable.

11 hours ago, hotchilli said:

The market dictates the price of rubber not the Thai government..

The world price of rubber is about the same as it was in 2005 and 1995, although there have been significant spikes in between.   Increase is use of plastics is a major factor.

https://www.indexmundi.com/commodities/?commodity=rubber&months=300

 

 If the Government subsidise one product, there would be demands from growers of other produce for similar treatment

11 hours ago, impulse said:

 

But government policies and propaganda encouraged the farmers to plant more rubber (and rice) to increase exports.  It's easy to blame the farmers, but if you track down the reason for the oversupply, it's the government programs. 

 

And if I were a betting man, I'd bet the middlemen are doing fine as the farmers are struggling.  That's another Thai phenomena...  The well connected middlemen make all the money.  Whether it's rice, rubber, or lumber.

 

The real problem with rubber is China has modernised it's rubber producing facilities and knocks out higher quality in volume at lower prices, Thai rubber is no longer in demand... poor quality at higher prices.
But Thais have no way to compete because their way is mostly family run, cheap labour intensive methods.

10 hours ago, rickudon said:

When i came here to live 9 years ago, i looked for suitable crops to boost the family income. I looked at rubber, but one days research was enough to tell me that there was a massive acreage of trees throughout SE Asia (not just Thailand) which had been planted but not yet ready for tapping.The current result was utterly predictable.

Which crop did you choose,if any?

We tried ducks, worked for a while, but egg prices dropped and was only breakeven. done a little bit of vegetable growing, but too labour intensive to really do commercially. I just concentrate on fishponds, but really hard to turn a profit when other family members ignore your scientifically based stocking ratios and overstock - loads of stunted fish and poor food conversion rates are the result.

 

Latest is mango trees ..... 

 

And, of course, any 'plan' always starts with - my money!

I wish the price of tires was dropping inline with the falling rubber prices.

1 hour ago, rickudon said:

We tried ducks, worked for a while, but egg prices dropped and was only breakeven. done a little bit of vegetable growing, but too labour intensive to really do commercially. I just concentrate on fishponds, but really hard to turn a profit when other family members ignore your scientifically based stocking ratios and overstock - loads of stunted fish and poor food conversion rates are the result.

 

Latest is mango trees ..... 

 

And, of course, any 'plan' always starts with - my money!

 

Have you ever shopped for avacadoes in Thailand?