Small farm management

[THAIPHUKET]

Whatever modern agriculture technics may be applicable to farms under 50rai, how can it be aquired.

 

 

[finnsk]

It depends on what activity you want, do you want activity which need a lot of man power or do you want easy farming ?

 

Let me tell what we are doing, the general (wife) and I, We have mixed egg laying with fruit production.

 

We have the hen farming on a semi pro level, with semi automated hen live stocks, that means we do not use much daily time on the hen care, but there is some strict routines we had to take care of every day.

 

The manure from the hen we use on the soil for the fruit trees, we are working with the fruit trees, finding ways to make things more easy, first we have maked automatic watering, thats a basic thing. We are planning the trees, so we can work on small tractors around and under the trees. Now our main project is to understand the soil and find a controlled fertilizing with a mix of hen manure and best NPK formular. We dont want to make a lot of chemical spraying on the fruits as our local nabos is doing, we want to optimize the soil for less work and better performance, that is a long way, you must have patience, I think it will take around 2 years before we have a safe formular for the soil.

 

High tech I dont know, but thats an interesting way of life to me.

[kickstart]

27 minutes ago, finnsk said:

It depends on what activity you want, do you want activity which need a lot of man power or do you want easy farming ?

 

Let me tell what we are doing, the general (wife) and I, We have mixed egg laying with fruit production.

 

We have the hen farming on a semi pro level, with semi automated hen live stocks, that means we do not use much daily time on the hen care, but there is some strict routines we had to take care of every day.

 

The manure from the hen we use on the soil for the fruit trees, we are working with the fruit trees, finding ways to make things more easy, first we have maked automatic watering, thats a basic thing. We are planning the trees, so we can work on small tractors around and under the trees. Now our main project is to understand the soil and find a controlled fertilizing with a mix of hen manure and best NPK formular. We dont want to make a lot of chemical spraying on the fruits as our local nabos is doing, we want to optimize the soil for less work and better performance, that is a long way, you must have patience, I think it will take around 2 years before we have a safe formular for the soil.

 

High tech I dont know, but thats an interesting way of life to me.

Fruit trees are OK ,but it's finding a market for the fruit ,this year with the cool weather our Mango trees are full ,they will be a glut of Mangos ,ie no market to sell them .one member last year said he was down 25k on selling his Mangos ,and he had several verities to sell .

Top fruit for the past few years have been loss making ,last year Lum-Rie they were a glut ,no market ,growers asked the government for help, government said no.

A lot of members say grow Durian ,not easy they only grow in certain areas, and they take a good few years before they is any fruit to sell.

[finnsk]

3 minutes ago, kickstart said:

Fruit trees are OK ,but it's finding a market for the fruit ,this year with the cool weather our Mango trees are full ,they will be a glut of Mangos ,ie no market to sell them .one member last year said he was down 25k on selling his Mangos ,and he had several verities to sell .

Top fruit for the past few years have been loss making ,last year Lum-Rie they were a glut ,no market ,growers asked the government for help, government said no.

A lot of members say grow Durian ,not easy they only grow in certain areas, and they take a good few years before they is any fruit to sell.

Yes there is a lot of problems with selling the traditional fruit, we are trying to make a mix of  different fruit types. Now we are scaling up on banana and early mango and scaling down on Lum rie, we are also trying with some "farrang" and we are trying to sell it on the local markets, we avoid the "fruit traders" with the risk, that we can risk some times have some fruit we can not sell, but better that, than work for free to make money to some greedy fruit traders.

 

The last year we have good income on hens and only low income on fruit, the comming year seems to be the same.

[farmerjo]

If you can find an agronomist whose up to date with techniques.

Some companies may be able to help with that,a company near me is a major corn buyer.

They will come and help with fertilizer,chemicals,seed variety as long as you buy the products from them.

They also have a drone service if required.

 

There are also people who run private workshops on growing certain crops.

And there also should be local Thai's in your amphur dedicated to helping with farm advice.

I myself find the internet a good source if you have the time and know what your looking for.

[huuwi]

On 2/27/2022 at 11:27 AM, finnsk said:

Yes there is a lot of problems with selling the traditional fruit, we are trying to make a mix of  different fruit types. Now we are scaling up on banana and early mango and scaling down on Lum rie, we are also trying with some "farrang" and we are trying to sell it on the local markets, we avoid the "fruit traders" with the risk, that we can risk some times have some fruit we can not sell, but better that, than work for free to make money to some greedy fruit traders.

 

The last year we have good income on hens and only low income on fruit, the comming year seems to be the same.

can i ask how many hens you have?

[THAIPHUKET]

Is not the fundamental problem that hardly any small farmer knows how to make the simplest of budget? If in that area some training available? A simple agricultural application could already be of immense help!

[Hummin]

What is the main purpose of your farming, and what have been there from before?
 

 

[kickstart]

9 hours ago, THAIPHUKET said:

Is not the fundamental problem that hardly any small farmer knows how to make the simplest of budget? If in that area some training available? A simple agricultural application could already be of immense help!

This question  come up in another thread not so long ago ,and I answered ,so here we go again .

How can you do a budget when you do not know what price you are getting when you sell  your crop ,ask a farmer bust before harvest how much he is getting for his crop ,and he will probably  say Mie-Roo do not know. 

He will probably   also  be in debt to the farmer's bank BAAC ,or like the  wife's  rice farmer son-in-law buys stuff from his local suppler on credit, and do not ask what interest  they charge ,so working out a budget when you are already in debt is not easy. 

You said use a small App on a mobile phone a good idea ,but could that app read a crystal ball and know about low price rice  farmers got for their  last harvest ,no one knew about the low selling  price at planting time,or the year before when it was a drought year and crops did not grow after planting.

[CLW]

On 4/1/2022 at 9:13 PM, kickstart said:

This question  come up in another thread not so long ago ,and I answered ,so here we go again .

How can you do a budget when you do not know what price you are getting when you sell  your crop ,ask a farmer bust before harvest how much he is getting for his crop ,and he will probably  say Mie-Roo do not know. 

He will probably   also  be in debt to the farmer's bank BAAC ,or like the  wife's  rice farmer son-in-law buys stuff from his local suppler on credit, and do not ask what interest  they charge ,so working out a budget when you are already in debt is not easy. 

You said use a small App on a mobile phone a good idea ,but could that app read a crystal ball and know about low price rice  farmers got for their  last harvest ,no one knew about the low selling  price at planting time,or the year before when it was a drought year and crops did not grow after planting.

KS is right about it, all calculations are worthless if you don't know the price to sell your produce.

Therefore, there are only two ways: you gamble and use the average prices from the last year or you find some company that does contract farming with you and buys the produce to an agreed price (signed and sealed document).

The latter might give you a slightly lower price but at least it's guaranteed they buy your product and it's not ending up as fertilizer....

[kickstart]

2 hours ago, CLW said:

KS is right about it, all calculations are worthless if you don't know the price to sell your produce.

Therefore, there are only two ways: you gamble and use the average prices from the last year or you find some company that does contract farming with you and buys the produce to an agreed price (signed and sealed document).

The latter might give you a slightly lower price but at least it's guaranteed they buy your product and it's not ending up as fertilizer....

About the only crop that I know of that will pay a fixed price is cucumbers ,most growers sell at an agreed price.

Contract farming in Thailand it has been done ,one in our area was chickens,with our friend  CP ,they gave you the young chicks ,you reared them ,using their  feed of cause, and they brought the broilers when they were fat ,if you lost a lot that was your problem .

But with all contracts ,I think they took the cost of the feed away from when you  sold the broilers to them.

Bottom line figure was not that good, a lot gave up after a few years ,still in debt from the borrowed money to build the chicken sheds. 

[Robin]

My observation of wife's family growing rice is that they do not even know their costs or last year's profit (loss)

Nor do they seem top care, just follow what their father did and hope.  Only innovation might be if some glib salesman come through selling some 'wonder fertilizer'  Knowledge of soil  fertilizer requirements or types of fertilizer non existent.  it appears to me a wonder that any Thai farmer makes any living.  

If government was serious about improving the lot of farmer they would offer some assistance or training for rural communities, but it is not in their interests to do so, so Thai agriculture stagnates in the 19th C and farmers stay poor.

[EVENKEEL]

37 minutes ago, Robin said:

My observation of wife's family growing rice is that they do not even know their costs or last year's profit (loss)

Nor do they seem top care, just follow what their father did and hope.  Only innovation might be if some glib salesman come through selling some 'wonder fertilizer'  Knowledge of soil  fertilizer requirements or types of fertilizer non existent.  it appears to me a wonder that any Thai farmer makes any living.  

If government was serious about improving the lot of farmer they would offer some assistance or training for rural communities, but it is not in their interests to do so, so Thai agriculture stagnates in the 19th C and farmers stay poor.

For the small time farmer the rice is for food, not for profit really is no need for record keeping. 

[farmerjo]

10 minutes ago, EVENKEEL said:

For the small time farmer the rice is for food, not for profit really is no need for record keeping. 

I bet they submit the paperwork for the government subsidies which is a form of record keeping.

There just not so good with the rest of it after that in some cases. 

[CLW]

On 4/3/2022 at 7:23 PM, kickstart said:

About the only crop that I know of that will pay a fixed price is cucumbers ,most growers sell at an agreed price.

Contract farming in Thailand it has been done ,one in our area was chickens,with our friend  CP ,they gave you the young chicks ,you reared them ,using their  feed of cause, and they brought the broilers when they were fat ,if you lost a lot that was your problem .

But with all contracts ,I think they took the cost of the feed away from when you  sold the broilers to them.

Bottom line figure was not that good, a lot gave up after a few years ,still in debt from the borrowed money to build the chicken sheds. 

With CP as contractor, there can only be one winner. Guess who...

[kickstart]

Any one else see this in the news section ,with the few rice farmers in our area,and wife's son-in -law,it will be a no go.

 

 

PATHUM THANI (NNT) - The Thai Rice Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions or the Thai Rice NAMA project is going to provide financial support packages to farmers and agripreneurs, so that they have better access to land preparation, laser land leveling (LLL) services, and stubble management for climate-smart rice farming.

 

The Thai Rice NAMA project is a collaboration between the Rice Department, the Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives (BAAC), and German International Cooperation (GIZ).

 

Representatives from the three agencies signed a grant agreement at Pathum Thani Rice Research Center to collaboratively implement the Half-Half co-payment scheme to make mitigation services and low-emission rice farming technologies accessible to Thai farmers and agripreneurs.

 

Keep up to date with all things Thailand - Join our daily ASEAN NOW Thailand Newsletter - Click to subscribe

 

Farmers living in pilot areas are eligible to apply for ‘Package 1’ of the scheme. Following approval, they will receive a 50% subsidy along with a 50% pre-finance option for Land Preparation and Laser Land Leveling (LLL) services in rice fields up to a maximum of 2,000 baht per rai in total.

 

Agripreneurs interested in becoming LLL service providers can apply for the so-called ‘Pro 2’ package. It includes free training programs organized by the project and the eligibility to apply for new financial measures for service providers to purchase the LLL equipment set. This financial measure will offer subsidies of up to 50% on each set price but not exceeding 200,000 baht per person.

 

Rice is important as it is cultivated on roughly half of all agricultural land in Thailand and accounts for nearly 55% of climate emissions from agriculture. Thailand is the world’s fourth-largest emitter of rice-related greenhouse gases. In irrigated rice production, flooding of paddy fields leads to significant emissions of methane, which has a global warming potential 28 times higher than carbon dioxide. The lack of incentives available to farmers is preventing a fast transition to low-emission rice production practic