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[webfact]

PM gives reassurances of serious effort in solving farmers' problems
By Digital Content



BANGKOK, Jan 29 -- Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha told a meeting of senior officials this morning at the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives that he is seriously trying to resolve farmers' problems.

Gen Prayut said that he was not ignoring their problems and is concerned that the problems had not been solved even though he had laid down revised policies.

The agriculture ministry is considering solutions to the low prices of rubber, tapioca, sugarcane, corn and rice. Rubber growers threatened to hold a major rally tomorrow to pressure the government for higher rubber prices.

The officials also considered marketing plans for farm products and land allocation for the poor.

Today the Ministry of Commerce held its first auction of government rice this year.

It involved the biggest rice amount in one auction and was the first auction for rice from the government's warehouses.

The event attracted 100 bidders and involved 990,000 tons of rice worth at least Bt11.6 billion. (MCOT online news)


-- TNA 2015-01-29

[Commerce]

100 hundred bidders from the owners of rice mills, per chance?

[Thai at Heart]

We are trying to think of ways of spreading happiness without seeming to spend any money like the last bunch.

[chainarong]

A Little less talk, just get on with it, lets see how well you do , my guess the farmers will still have their problems this time next year and in ten years time.

[DonaldBattles]

Farming efficiency is Thailand is so poor that they may never be able to support themselves. Instead of giving them 15,000 for nothing they should be investing in automated harvesting and planting machines for rice.

I noticed in Chiang Rai they have planted a huge crop of tapioca to be sold to make gasohol. As the price of oil is down very low what kind of price will they be willing to pay the farmers when they harvest it. We had the same problem with corn a few years ago.

Free money to the farmers is real BS and dead ended.

[englishoak]

We are trying to think of ways of spreading happiness without seeming to spend any money like the last bunch.

They need to work on that without seeming to a bit more then

[Robby nz]

Farming efficiency is Thailand is so poor that they may never be able to support themselves. Instead of giving them 15,000 for nothing they should be investing in automated harvesting and planting machines for rice.

I noticed in Chiang Rai they have planted a huge crop of tapioca to be sold to make gasohol. As the price of oil is down very low what kind of price will they be willing to pay the farmers when they harvest it. We had the same problem with corn a few years ago.

Free money to the farmers is real BS and dead ended.

Don't know what you mean by automated harvesting and planting machines.

All but the very smallest of paddy is harvested by machine like this :

Most planting around here is done by broadcasting seed directly onto the paddy, where transplanting is used it is mostly done by machine.

[Robby nz]

100 hundred bidders from the owners of rice mills, per chance?

Why would rice mills want to buy rice that has already been milled ?

The job of a rice mill is to take the paddy and mill it into rice.

They sometimes mill the paddy on behalf of a buyer who has bought the paddy from the farmer as happened during the pledging scheme when it was the then Govt that bought the rice from the farmer with the mill as a sort of middle man.

The bidders in this instant will be traders who have customers that they will want the rice that they bid on.

Very likely the rice that a bidder buys would go straight to a customer from the warehouse it was sourced from.

[DonaldBattles]

The paddy has to be transplanted after the seeds germinate. The transplanting using planting machines is very fast. Very few harvesting machines are seen in this area.

I don't see any machines for tapioca planting or harvesting. Also, have not seen machines for planting or harvesting corn.

[greenchair]

In most countries, some essential services need to be subsidised.

No farmers = no rice = no food

If the farmers are not making money, they will look for other jobs. Eventually thailand would need to import it's rice.

Let's hear the people complain when they have to pay import prices.

The question is -----

How can we subsidise the farmers and make it look different from yinglucks subsidy scheme ??????????????????????????

[maidee]

GMO in thailand ?

they should start organic farming

[DonaldBattles]

I think you would be surprised to know how much GM growing that is taking place in Thailand now. You can start with corn and papaya.

If there is a way to cheat the system, the farmers here will learn about it and use.

[rickirs]

"the problems had not been solved even though he had laid down revised policies."

Maybe, just maybe those "revised policies" are failures and that's why problems are not being solved. Too bad the Thai People can't call for a vote of confidence on Prime Minister Gen. Prayuth and replace him with someone whose policies will work.

[rickirs]

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In most countries, some essential services need to be subsidised.
No farmers = no rice = no food
If the farmers are not making money, they will look for other jobs. Eventually thailand would need to import it's rice.
Let's hear the people complain when they have to pay import prices.
The question is -----
How can we subsidise the farmers and make it look different from yinglucks subsidy scheme

Thailand has a claimed unemployment rate of 0.1%! There are no available jobs in a fully employed society. Farmers are virtual economic prisoners.

[scorecard]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

In most countries, some essential services need to be subsidised.
No farmers = no rice = no food
If the farmers are not making money, they will look for other jobs. Eventually thailand would need to import it's rice.
Let's hear the people complain when they have to pay import prices.
The question is -----
How can we subsidise the farmers and make it look different from yinglucks subsidy scheme

Thailand has a claimed unemployment rate of 0.1%! There are no available jobs in a fully employed society. Farmers are virtual economic prisoners.

You win the grand prize for the silliest comment of the week.

On the other hand I guess it keeps your post tally up.

[Robby nz]

The paddy has to be transplanted after the seeds germinate. The transplanting using planting machines is very fast. Very few harvesting machines are seen in this area.

I don't see any machines for tapioca planting or harvesting. Also, have not seen machines for planting or harvesting corn.

Sorry you need to get out more and watch what actually happens, rice seed around here (central plains) is now mostly broadcast directly on to paddy rather than the plants transplanted from nursery.

Tapioca is grown from cuttings which are put into the ground by hand, the roots are plowed out by machine and picked up by machine on the bigger fields.

Corn is grown from seed which is mostly planted by machine and it is harvested by machine except on smaller plots.

All these things are done by contractors (as is plowing) so each individual farmer has no need to buy machinery

[Robby nz]

In most countries, some essential services need to be subsidised.

No farmers = no rice = no food

If the farmers are not making money, they will look for other jobs. Eventually thailand would need to import it's rice.

Let's hear the people complain when they have to pay import prices.

The question is -----

How can we subsidise the farmers and make it look different from yinglucks subsidy scheme ??????????????????????????

Try to get over it.

Yinglucks rice pledging scheme was not a subsidy scheme it was an out of budget self funding intervention into the market that was supposed to force up world prices and run at a profit.

We are now seeing the consequences of that.

[DonaldBattles]

All the big money is in the central plains. Very little of it ever gets up here in the north. This is a different world from all the rich farmers in the central plains. Esan is about the same. Sorry, after living in thailand 31 years and in 9 different provinces the poor farmers get poorer. Much of this brought on themselves.

[billd766]

Farming efficiency is Thailand is so poor that they may never be able to support themselves. Instead of giving them 15,000 for nothing they should be investing in automated harvesting and planting machines for rice.

I noticed in Chiang Rai they have planted a huge crop of tapioca to be sold to make gasohol. As the price of oil is down very low what kind of price will they be willing to pay the farmers when they harvest it. We had the same problem with corn a few years ago.

Free money to the farmers is real BS and dead ended.

Down here in Khampaeng Phet the price for tapioca is 2,300 baht down from 2,500 two weeks ago.

[Robby nz]

All the big money is in the central plains. Very little of it ever gets up here in the north. This is a different world from all the rich farmers in the central plains. Esan is about the same. Sorry, after living in thailand 31 years and in 9 different provinces the poor farmers get poorer. Much of this brought on themselves.

As has been written in more than one report the money from the pledging scheme only reached a small percentage of the poor farmers and they got an even small percentage.

The farmers on the central plains are not rich although they are a lot better off than the smaller (poorer) farmers. They don't have new vehicles, big houses and a lot rent land as do many of the poor.

The ones who appear to be better off are the bigger contractors but even most of them could not by any stretch be called rich.

The land owners who increased the rent to get a share of the pledging windfall and have not dropped the rents now the scheme is finished, now they are the rich.

[metisdead]

An inflammatory post has been removed.