Combine harvester market in Thailand - New vs used machineries for corn

[Postharvesting]

Dear all,

I want to understand Corn harvesting practices in Thailand.

What is region-wise row spacing for planting corns in Thailand? Who are the leading players? How much % share of corn combine harvesters in the total combine harvester market? Is corn harvesting segment dominated by used machineries? Why existing players are not entering this segment aggressively? Is corn market size expected to increase in Thailand?

Who are the corn combine harvester importers in Thailand?

Thank you in advance for your inputs.

[farmerjo]

I have a corn kit that adapts my Kubota dc-70g harvester from grains to corn.

The government was talking about heavily taxing any 2nd hand agriculture machinery imported,whether it happened with covid i don't know.

Only a small amount of corn is grown in my area and even less since the armyworm landed in Thailand.

[Postharvesting]

Dear Farmerjo,

Which area Do you belong to?

do you have original corn kit provided by Kubota? How is the performance?

and is it easy to interchange the corn kit?

is contracting for harvesting is common in area where you reside in?

[farmerjo]

4 minutes ago, Postharvesting said:

Dear Farmerjo,

Which area Do you belong to?

do you have original corn kit provided by Kubota? How is the performance?

and is it easy to interchange the corn kit?

is contracting for harvesting is common in area where you reside in?

We farm in the Chumphae area of Khon Kaen.

Yes it's an original Kubota corn kit.

Takes me about 3 hours to change parts over and works good once i added more angle to the fingers to stop cobs falling out of the front.

On the row spacings used here(600 and 750mm) you only harvest 3 rows at a time.

Farmers around here are to tight to pay for most things.

I did see one rice harvester last harvest but how much work it got i don't know.

I used to grow corn yearly but as i said the army worm and extra spraying insecticide passes turned me off.

This year i will be attempting my first harvest of sesame seed with the harvester.

In the past i've done rice,sunn hemp and corn with it,grains are easy as only real change is the screen size and adjusting fan speed.

[Postharvesting]

thank you! 
can you tell me more about the corn harvesting practices.

1. Does the farmer who is producing rice will produce corn as well?

2. What is the harvesting season for corn in Thailand? Does it change as per the regions?

3. How much time do you take to harvest corn using combine harvester? How much rai per day?

4. Is corn harvesting completely mechanised or it’s partially mechanised? Please explain

5. what happens to residue producer after corn harvesting ? Do you sell it?

[farmerjo]

1 hour ago, Postharvesting said:

thank you! 
can you tell me more about the corn harvesting practices.

1. Does the farmer who is producing rice will produce corn as well?

2. What is the harvesting season for corn in Thailand? Does it change as per the regions?

3. How much time do you take to harvest corn using combine harvester? How much rai per day?

4. Is corn harvesting completely mechanised or it’s partially mechanised? Please explain

5. what happens to residue producer after corn harvesting ? Do you sell it?

Member Kickstart knows more about corn in general as there is a lot more demand for the product in his area.

Some farmers will grow corn in the dry season after rice but only a few do that around here.

If we plant corn here as a main crop it is seeded mid april and harvested mid july,it gets to wet here after then.

I normally do about  15 -20 rai a day harvesting but for me it's about drying space after harvesting not how much i can do in a day.

A lot of corn here is still picked and husks removed by hand before going to the buyer to shell.

After harvest i use a slasher/brushhog to mow the stalks and leave on the surface.

[Postharvesting]

What is the average rent does anyone get for renting out combine harvester or Baler to other farmers in your region?

[kickstart]

14 minutes ago, Postharvesting said:

What is the average rent does anyone get for renting out combine harvester or Baler to other farmers in your region?

No rented  equipment ,Normaly a contractor comes with his combine  and harvests the crop in my area for corn and rice this year it was 600/baht/ria .

Balling it is done on price the baling guy also sells the straw ,the rice farmer will sell his straw  to the balling guy for a few hundred baht /rie 

 

[farmerjo]

Last time i enquired it was 20 baht for a small square bale here which is why nobody does it.

If someone needs straw for animals they organize to have peoples rice harvest transported and threshed at their land into a pile.

Harvesting for rice had a 600 baht/rai cap from the government,that may of changed.

Corn i don't know.

[Elkski]

Sadly some corn is grown in steep hillsides in the North like chang rai.  It must be harvested by hand and then residual is just burned because how else to do it lazily? 

It would be nice if the government can incentivize equipment use on sugar cane to help stop the burning and air pollution.    

So many small farms, many don't have adaquate access for larger tractors, just no money or incentive to change.   Me thinks. 

[kickstart]

17 hours ago, Postharvesting said:

thank you! 
can you tell me more about the corn harvesting practices.

1. Does the farmer who is producing rice will produce corn as well?

2. What is the harvesting season for corn in Thailand? Does it change as per the regions?

3. How much time do you take to harvest corn using combine harvester? How much rai per day?

4. Is corn harvesting completely mechanised or it’s partially mechanised? Please explain

5. what happens to residue producer after corn harvesting ? Do you sell it?

 

Most rice farmers will only grow rice ,remember a rice field is wet the who;e time any corn planted will just rot,like corn farmers will only grow corn.

Growing season normaly starts in April/May depending on the rains ,corn is a 110 day crop ,so harvest will be about August /September time ,then some farmers will plant a second  crop ,that will be harvested November/December time .

Most of Thailand is the same ,but I am in Lopburi province a big buyer near me has had corn come from the Northern provinces this time of year ,not certain if it has just  harvested ,or been in store.

A combine most are 12 foot cut's can do a 25 rie block in a morning ,if it all goes well ,most combines go to fast ,they what to get the job done and losses can be high .cost is 600 baht/rie.

Before farmers used to "Hack Khowport",that is just harvest the cobs put them in sacks and take them to the buyer ,but now I would say 80?? % is harvested by a combine,some small growers know it is not viable to get the combine in ,so they harvest by hand the pickers are paid per sack it was 30-50baht /sack harvested ,then for loading and unloading .a few baht/sack.

The residue after the combine  is left in the field and ploughed in ,crops harvested by hand the buyer trashes the cobs ,in our area we have a company that dries seed corn for other company's ,they often buy the spent cobs and use them as fuel for their corn drying ovens .

A good few years ago some farmers kept they picked crop and got the mobile thrasher in they sold the corn ,and a few use to make charcoal from the spent cobs ,not seen this for a long time, the wife did it when she was a kid.