A few days back I had a discussion with the better half why her family's rice paddies -- especially the planting -- is not more mechanized. Her two parents plant rice on nearly 40 rai basically by themselves and are sick afterwards every single year because of the immense strain on the body, especially the back.

I saw a system on TV where the rice is planted on plastic mats(?) which are rolled out on the fields instead of the extremely labor-intensive transplanting; the mats will prevent weeds and keep the plants at the right distance too. Other transplanting systems seem to pluck seedlings into the flooded fields.

Her only comment was that yield would be low.

Has anybody here used such a system before? Is it true that yields suffer to such an extent that traditional transplanting is preferable? Any idea on costs, eg the machine itself, other accessories needed.

I would guess that such a machine would be extremely expensive. Maae and Paaw would never buy it, and if you bought it for them, they would fuss up a storm.

Better for you to go hire a few somchais to help them do it the manual way. You give their backs some relief and help out a few villagers also.

Good karma for you.

They are expensive to purchase - and then maintain: I can't see you being able to re-coup the investment against current Thai farmgate prices for rice - as high as they currently are, unless you had several hundred rai of rice.

Where it may just possibly make sense is if you had a co-operative agreement amongst a whole bunch of farmers in one area (one area otherwise you then need to purchase transport for the machine) - who all clubbed together for its purchase and who all used it on their land each season. That may make sense - but not on any single farm, excepting a very large one.

They are expensive to purchase - and then maintain: I can't see you being able to re-coup the investment against current Thai farmgate prices for rice - as high as they currently are, unless you had several hundred rai of rice.

Where it may just possibly make sense is if you had a co-operative agreement amongst a whole bunch of farmers in one area (one area otherwise you then need to purchase transport for the machine) - who all clubbed together for its purchase and who all used it on their land each season. That may make sense - but not on any single farm, excepting a very large one.

Thanks, that answers it for me. I am not looking to involve myself in a major investment of some form, especially not for rice farming, which seems to be a good way to get rid of your money.

In Japan, I've seen rice farmers using a low tech stick like gadget that takes the bending over out of manual rice planting. Not seen one up close but they put the rice plant in a kind of thin tin can on a stick which they then push into the paddy and release. A lot easier and a bit quicker than stooping over.

They are expensive to purchase - and then maintain: I can't see you being able to re-coup the investment against current Thai farmgate prices for rice - as high as they currently are, unless you had several hundred rai of rice.

Where it may just possibly make sense is if you had a co-operative agreement amongst a whole bunch of farmers in one area (one area otherwise you then need to purchase transport for the machine) - who all clubbed together for its purchase and who all used it on their land each season. That may make sense - but not on any single farm, excepting a very large one.

Thanks, that answers it for me. I am not looking to involve myself in a major investment of some form, especially not for rice farming, which seems to be a good way to get rid of your money.

...... well said!