Singburi pilots national organic rice project

SINGBURI: -- Thailand's central province of Singburi is acting as a pilot province in a government project to promote organic rice farming, with the eventual aim of extending organic farming across the entire region.

Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Khun Ying Sudarat Keyuraphan, who today presided over the launch of an organic community rice farming project in Inburi district, said that by 2007 the province hoped to turn over all 380,000 rai of its paddy land to organic farming.

Although Singburi is one of the nation's most important rice-growing provinces, producing an average of 600,000 tonnes of rice each year, intensive farming and the heavy use of agricultural chemicals have taken their toll on the land.

In order to revive the land and reduce production costs, the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives is supporting campaigns in Singburi to encourage organic farming.

Initially piloted on 22,690 rai of paddy fields cultivated by 1,380 farmers, the project will be extended to cover all of the province's rice-growing areas.

Khun Ying Sudarat, who said that organic farming would cut production costs by Bt650 per rai, added that after the project would be extended to surrounding projects after an initial assessment of the Singburi pilot in 2007.

--TNA 2005-06-03

I was lead to believe, that for any crop to be deemed truly organic, the soil had to be free of any man made pesticides etc for 5 years.