Rice Pledging - How Has It Affected You?

[GentlemanJim]

Cards on the table, I am not a farmer, but am extremely interested from an economic view of the country how the rice pledging scheme has benefitted those people at the coal face so to speak. Has rice pledging made a difference to your income, what are your hopes/fears now that the Government have said the policy will continue throughout 2013? What are your views on the scheme and how effectively it will contribute to the Governments aspirations of raising world rice prices to $800-$850 per tonne (when currently Vietnam and India are selling at $420 and $415 respectively). Any feedback from the real people involved in this would be genuinely appreciated.

[GentlemanJim]

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

[somo]

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

As you say "Cards on the table, I am not a farmer" so why are you posting here?

Most farmers are not interested in politics

[tingtong]

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

As you say "Cards on the table, I am not a farmer" so why are you posting here?

Most farmers are not interested in politics

non-politically,

it was said that jasmine rice ( hom mali) will have a 20thb/kg price.from government.

this week locally the buy price is 14thb for it.

where that 6 thb/kg goes?

[GentlemanJim]

non-politically,

it was said that jasmine rice ( hom mali) will have a 20thb/kg price.from government.

this week locally the buy price is 14thb for it.

where that 6 thb/kg goes?

Thanks for the reply. Seems like a 20% cream off going on.

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

As you say "Cards on the table, I am not a farmer" so why are you posting here?

Most farmers are not interested in politics

Do you have to be a farmer to post here? Where else should one post to get the views of farmers? The teachers forum perhaps, or the football forum? I never expressed an interest in politics, I was expressing an interest in economics, a subject that most farmers would normally be interested in, lest they become ex-farmers.

[xen]

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

As you say "Cards on the table, I am not a farmer" so why are you posting here?

Most farmers are not interested in politics

I am not an active farmer either but have an interest in this subject as my Father in Law is a rice farmer, and i would suspect many other TV members would also have some connection to Rice even if it as an end consumer. Unfortunately ,in life, most of us are under the thumb of politics and economics and either good or bad politics will have some influence on how well we live our lives.

[GentlemanJim]

Wow! 117 views and nobody farming rice to comment. Thanks anyway.

As you say "Cards on the table, I am not a farmer" so why are you posting here?

Most farmers are not interested in politics

I am not an active farmer either but have an interest in this subject as my Father in Law is a rice farmer, and i would suspect many other TV members would also have some connection to Rice even if it as an end consumer. Unfortunately ,in life, most of us are under the thumb of politics and economics and either good or bad politics will have some influence on how well we live our lives.

Therefore Somo, do you have perhaps a reply that is a little more informative or do you just like playing the obtuse one?

[somo]

I grow cassava which also has a supposed Gov. support price except no one has been able to get it. The buyers would only give the subsidy for half the amount the grower sold but the grower had to sign for the lot.

The whole system is riddled with corruption and just today heard a new twist. The growers were given bits of paper allowing them to sell 100 tons at the support price. The wholesale guys didn't honour them but are buying up the bits of paper to claim the subsidy. Current rate is 5000 Baht but only once the gov has paid the subsidy into the growers bank. In most cases the subsidy for 100 tons would come to about 70-80,000! MIL just handed over our bit of paper as it is the only money we will ever get out of the scheme.

All these schemes are just an excuse for the middlemen to swindle the Government and farmers. I think about 10% (if that) trickles down to the people it was supposed to help.

It is very unlikely future schemes will operate any more effectively as the people designing them are the ones stealing the money.

Edited June 27, 2012 by somo

[loong]

I believe that one of the problems with any sort of subsidy is that it encourages lethargy.

It also seems that no matter that everytime, the corrupt middlemen take the lion's share of the subidy, most of the farmers will believe that they will receive a guaranteed price for their crop.

The vietnamese farmers are getting double the yield of Thai rice farmers. How do the Thais respond to this? They say that the quality of the vietnamese rice is not so good.

Well, I live in Thailand so I very much doubt that I am likely to be able to sample vietnamese rice (unless it is smuggled in to get the higher pledged price)

I am a consumer of rice, not a grower. As a consumer I am finding it more and more difficult to purchase decent Jasmine rice. The jasmine rice sold here typically contains as much as 10% sticky rice. This is not good enough.

Thai farmers are lucky to have the Land developement department, they will offer advice for increasing yields and quality. Even free seeds for green manuring.

Increasing yields requires some effort. Give the average farmer the choice of putting in the effort to increase yields and quality or a subsidised price for their low yields, they will often go for the subsidy, whether it actually materialises as cash in their hand or not.

[somo]

There was a scandal earlier which has really damaged Thailands reputation as a major supplier of cassava. Shipments were found to contain a high proportion of earth mixed in. Warehouses were then examined and this practice was found to be widespread. When we sell our cassava the buyers who chip and dry it cut the published price by 10% to allow for the dirt content. This is just another scam as dirt probably accounts for less than 1% of the weight. It now seems that they are adding their own dirt to boost the weight further. The end users, mostly the Chinese, are going to start offering reduced prices for Thai cassava if this continues. It seems Thailand is cursed with a cultural belief that cheating is somehow OK if you can get away with it and to hell with the consequences. When you ask youngsters what they want to be they come up with things like "fuel truck driver"

They explain that drivers can steal fuel and make a lot on the side (80-100k/month) so it is a great job. TIT

[Ruin]

Loong, I have heard that about Vietnamese rice but when I have been there on business, the rice either in hotels or small roadside cafes tastes as good as Thai rice. Must be my uncultivated palette!

[Foreverford]

yeah I was a bit incapacitated at harvest. Harvest is when you pay all the vbills because got to get it out of the wet into the pile then off the straw into the bags dried to optimum out and into the bags if necessary and anywhere to do it with the weather then the cost to get it to the buyers warehouses and and then no warehouses wants to do this govt idioticy so can't sell to them at 20 and there are only a few houses buying under the govt program; as it was easy to promise but there was no delivery by the paper pushers and the plant growers brogught in their wares. Some day they would only process three!! trucks with the paperwork for pledged rice and the other dozens to hundreds of vehicles in the cue could spend the night and hope it didn;'t rain or as they always do sell to the houses out of program price. My FIL got conned into 11 baht for organic hom Mali and never even saw close to 14. Some might remember the little bit of flood waters to deal with. we were flooded early and manage to sve the crop others lost theirs (organic methods and nano-calcium and high foliar feedings of essential micros were teh key i believe) then a big drought hit and turned everything the other way. the new water and irrrigation system saved us again and then the big floods came sooooooo not a very big rice harvest on top of that, Weneed to feed nearly 20 people with the rice there wasn't so much to sell and when I found out our big farm's entire minmal harvest was conned away for 11 baht we didn't make the money to get the stugff ojut of thr ground and into the mill. Our premium stuff was completely held back to feed the family and hopefully a few newer bigger strains are harvested and in bagsand will make for a good seed stock for this year. we got hammered by this 20 baht bull. It just gave the buyers another edge to get the ignorant indebted Issan farmers completely devastated. i guaranteed my FIL that I will buy all his rice this year for 11 and yes we started with flooding again which scrtewqwed the palnting again this year but now are in a drought so we maintain consistency over the last half dozen years. Enormous crop of Jack fruit this year as effects of lots of organic compost and EM are showing.