Farmers shouldn’t have to sacrifice their land to save Bangkok from floods

[elgordo38]

4 hours ago, NongKhaiKid said:

Why shouldn't they, isn't Bkk the centre of the known universe ?

Never much reaction to or action on flooding until it's lapping at Bkk's door.

Yes there is Bangkok and then the rest of the country. 

[bark]

8 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

not the only crop, but the biggest

Terrace Farming. Google it. Become educated.

And I guess the farmers just let the trees that they cut down to farm, lay in a pile in a corner of the farm; and not sell them.

 

[Srikcir]

3 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

We sold 50 tons of Jasmin rice to the government over 3 years ago, still waiting for payment 

That's a lot of patience.

If that sale was done under Yingluck's rice pledge program, you should have been paid in full by BAAC under Prayut's payout plan. Otherwise, are there grounds for a criminal complaint that might provide some compensation?

[soalbundy]

2 minutes ago, bark said:

Terrace Farming. Google it. Become educated.

And I guess the farmers just let the trees that they cut down to farm, lay in a pile in a corner of the farm; and not sell them.

 

This isn't Inca country, where i am it is flat and we do have trees on and around the rice fields, most do in fact, obviously not forests. As for cutting down trees you can get into serious trouble for doing so. In my village recently a large tree was cut down next to a road because it was rotting from the inside and was a hazard, the police and various officials were there immediately wanting to know if they had permission and checked on the condition of the tree.

I have seen trees being processed with chain saws, planks being cut down the length of a large tree with a chain saw and done so well i thought the planks had come from a mill. Farmers aren't idiots.

[fruitman]

18 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

some land, especially in Isaan is only good for rice, but it doesn't seem to matter what you grow the price is always lousy, we have had people here change to rubber trees, look what happened to the rubber price. We keep pigs and frogs as well, pigs are a lot of work ( if done humanely) and expensive,let's see what happens to the price of pork. We sold 50 tons of Jasmin rice to the government over 3 years ago, still waiting for payment 

 

What about the rubber which is of inferior quality? Do they produce good enough quality these days or still mix it with chemicals so it's unusable for Michelin?

[Stargeezr]

I have been in Bangkok when the city had a rain storm, and the streets became flooded

quickly. I even sat in a taxi on a ramp near the old airport for 30 minutes because the street ahead

was a meter under water. During the flood of 2009 I was also in Bangkok and we had to avoid some

streets. The bus depot was flooded and we had to get on the bus a few KMs away.

  near the river there were sand bags to help keep the river from flooding New Road..

    Bangkok is a city of 10 million people. Did you commenters know that?

   Yes  that  is  what  I  thought.

Geezer

[soalbundy]

3 minutes ago, Srikcir said:

That's a lot of patience.

If that sale was done under Yingluck's rice pledge program, you should have been paid in full by BAAC under Prayut's payout plan. Otherwise, are there grounds for a criminal complaint that might provide some compensation?

We were one of the last to harvest under the scheme (our village that is) when time came for payment we were told that the till was empty and we would have to wait. A delegation was sent to Bangkok and came back with empty promises, a demonstration was held outside the government bank in the nearest market town where one farmer cut his wrists and smeared his own blood on the doors of the bank, they were all arrested by the army, the police who had some sympathy with the farmers because they also grow rice tried to intervene with the army but were told to p*** off. I believe a lawyer was consulted but they were told it would be unpatriotic to sue and it would be ''better'' for them to wait ( or else)

[licka]

3 hours ago, kannot said:

i think the Thaksin era can prove u wrong

Some people will sell their souls for 500 baht

[soalbundy]

1 minute ago, licka said:

Some people will sell their souls for 500 baht

Actually it was more like 200 Baht but that could be raised by taking money from more than one candidate and then voting how you wanted 

[Familyonthemove]

I think if we apply cold logic, then keeping the auto parts and electronics factories dry is the number one priority.   Jobs, exports and foreign investment all gone if they flood again. 

 

Next is farms - food production is kind of important. 

 

Next is protecting the high density outer Bangkok homes as there's limited insurance and means to rebuild. 

 

And finally keeping those Mercs and Ferraris in underground in Chidlom car parks dry.

 

In practice I think it's the other way around.   But I live in Chidlom, so better not complain too loudly!

[trogers]

11 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

Actually it was more like 200 Baht but that could be raised by taking money from more than one candidate and then voting how you wanted 

 

Vote how you want, choosing which group of investors out to make big bucks is Sophie's choice...

[licka]

15 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

Actually it was more like 200 Baht but that could be raised by taking money from more than one candidate and then voting how you wanted 

Corruption from politicians is a world wide event, but sad none the less for the poor of this world

[Grubster]

2 hours ago, whatproblem said:

Pay the farmers compensation and not let the middlemen steal it

Yes like pay them for the estimated crop they would get in an average year minus the cost of harvesting. They get all that and much more in the US, but then farms in the US are mostly large very powerful corporations. Apples to Oranges I guess.

[Jai Dee]

Several troll posts and replies have been removed from this thread.

[robblok]

34 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

We were one of the last to harvest under the scheme (our village that is) when time came for payment we were told that the till was empty and we would have to wait. A delegation was sent to Bangkok and came back with empty promises, a demonstration was held outside the government bank in the nearest market town where one farmer cut his wrists and smeared his own blood on the doors of the bank, they were all arrested by the army, the police who had some sympathy with the farmers because they also grow rice tried to intervene with the army but were told to p*** off. I believe a lawyer was consulted but they were told it would be unpatriotic to sue and it would be ''better'' for them to wait ( or else)

If YL had set aside the money you would not have been in all this trouble. It really sucks to be a pawn in a political game that is for sure. Hope you guys get the money owed. 

[GeorgeCross]

3 hours ago, fruitman said:

 

Yup but the Bangkokians are not so stupid to sell them for 500 baht. They must have brains in that city.

 

as opposed to the farmers who took 500 baht from BOTH sides and voted accordingly.. dumbasses 

 

 

[impulse]

2 hours ago, robblok said:

I agree 100% and I was flooded longer because of downtown BKK. Its just the way it is and logical. You can't flood the economical heart of the country. It would be so damaging. So just sacrifice the farmers is a far better option. However the compensation for doing so should be a lot higher. This will also increase the governments efforts to build better water management infrastructure. 

 

Because if its too cheap to flood the farmers why invest. 

 

We both agree on the underlined sentence.

[Grubster]

51 minutes ago, soalbundy said:

some land, especially in Isaan is only good for rice, but it doesn't seem to matter what you grow the price is always lousy, we have had people here change to rubber trees, look what happened to the rubber price. We keep pigs and frogs as well, pigs are a lot of work ( if done humanely) and expensive,let's see what happens to the price of pork. We sold 50 tons of Jasmin rice to the government over 3 years ago, still waiting for payment 

Palm oil is the next disaster crop, with Indonesia cutting out huge tracts of forest to plant the palm oil crop. I don't know why no country has jumped on the Hemp production, it could be such a valuable crop and would also open up all kinds of production opportunities. There are strains of hemp that has nearly zero THC in it. I hope Thailand is the first to go after it.

[FredNL]

I still wonder what kind of license you need for a waterscooter (jetski) taxi business.

[fruitman]

17 minutes ago, FredNL said:

I still wonder what kind of license you need for a waterscooter (jetski) taxi business.

 

I wonder why they don't develop silent jetski's. Those can be great fast taxi's for Bangkok.

[billd766]

3 hours ago, bark said:

Wrong.

The farmers and their families are the reason why Mr. T was able to become PM.

 

You are wrong also. It is not the number of votes that count but the number of votes needed per constituency seat that matter. More votes are needed per seat in Bangkok than in Issan.

 

Going slightly off topic to the last UK general election the SNP gathered 1,454436 votes in Scotland and had 56 elected MPs, the Lib Dems were more spread out in the UK and gathered 2,415,888 but only gained 8 seats. UKIP who gathered 3,881,129 (only 10,805 votes less that the SNP and Lib Dems combined) only got 1 seat.

The DUP party in Northern Ireland only gathered 184,260 but also gained 8 seats and Sinn Fein gathered 176,232 and got 4 seats.

 

Voting in Thailand is much the same as the UK and relies on election boundaries rather than on the average number of voters per constituency. Add to that each party also has a number of party list seats allocated as well depending on the number of seats won rather than the number of votes cast.

 

IMHO the best thing that Thailand could do is to scrap the party list seats and divide the total population by the number of seats and then redraw the election boundaries on a "per head" basis. That way each constituency would have roughly an equal number of voters per MP.

[bark]

1 hour ago, billd766 said:

 

You are wrong also. It is not the number of votes that count but the number of votes needed per constituency seat that matter. More votes are needed per seat in Bangkok than in Issan.

 

Going slightly off topic to the last UK general election the SNP gathered 1,454436 votes in Scotland and had 56 elected MPs, the Lib Dems were more spread out in the UK and gathered 2,415,888 but only gained 8 seats. UKIP who gathered 3,881,129 (only 10,805 votes less that the SNP and Lib Dems combined) only got 1 seat.

The DUP party in Northern Ireland only gathered 184,260 but also gained 8 seats and Sinn Fein gathered 176,232 and got 4 seats.

 

Voting in Thailand is much the same as the UK and relies on election boundaries rather than on the average number of voters per constituency. Add to that each party also has a number of party list seats allocated as well depending on the number of seats won rather than the number of votes cast.

 

IMHO the best thing that Thailand could do is to scrap the party list seats and divide the total population by the number of seats and then redraw the election boundaries on a "per head" basis. That way each constituency would have roughly an equal number of voters per MP.

So if the poor peoples vote did not matter; and only Bangkok votes matter. How did Mr. T and family win 3 election ?

And no cares about UK, anymore. Great Britain is not so great anymore. And when Scotland and the Green guys leave in two

years; it will be you and the Whalers left.

 

[soalbundy]

8 hours ago, Grubster said:

Palm oil is the next disaster crop, with Indonesia cutting out huge tracts of forest to plant the palm oil crop. I don't know why no country has jumped on the Hemp production, it could be such a valuable crop and would also open up all kinds of production opportunities. There are strains of hemp that has nearly zero THC in it. I hope Thailand is the first to go after it.

I agree, would be a good opportunity, but you would need a business man with a lot of money to create a market.no market, no crop. 

[soalbundy]

4 hours ago, bark said:

So if the poor peoples vote did not matter; and only Bangkok votes matter. How did Mr. T and family win 3 election ?

And no cares about UK, anymore. Great Britain is not so great anymore. And when Scotland and the Green guys leave in two

years; it will be you and the Whalers left.

 

Moby Dick died years ago

[soalbundy]

7 hours ago, fruitman said:

 

I wonder why they don't develop silent jetski's. Those can be great fast taxi's for Bangkok.

just don't let any of the klong water get into your mouth

[Grubster]

1 hour ago, soalbundy said:

I agree, would be a good opportunity, but you would need a business man with a lot of money to create a market.no market, no crop. 

Yes it could open a new industry here. It is the strongest plant fiber in the world, plastics, composites, rope, many other uses.

[billd766]

21 hours ago, bark said:

So if the poor peoples vote did not matter; and only Bangkok votes matter. How did Mr. T and family win 3 election ?

And no cares about UK, anymore. Great Britain is not so great anymore. And when Scotland and the Green guys leave in two

years; it will be you and the Whalers left.

 

 

Where did I say that? I used the UK as an example because it has an electoral system that I was brought up in and have some knowledge about. If you had bothered to read and understand what I had written you wold see that NO voter is missed out, there are NO party list MP's, and each constituency nationwide would roughly  have an equal number of voters.

Thaksin won on the number of seats plus party list MPs. Take away the party lists, make EACH MP stand in a constituency, average out the voter numbers and see what happens.

 

I will assume that you are not from the UK or Europe and believe that nobody cares about the UK any more but you would be incorrect. Even the EU has refused to accept Scotland as a member.

 

As for Scotland leaving the Union, that is contingent on them winning the vote. They failed last time despite stacking the odds in their favour.

 

Which is the Green country?

 

People from Wales are not called Whalers. That is a term used to describe a certain group of fishermen who go and catch whales and another meaning describes a type of small boat powered by oars and men.

 

The correct term for people who come from Wales is either Welsh or Celtic.

 

You really need to do some research on topics before you post. It may save you from looking foolish.

[fruitman]

17 hours ago, soalbundy said:

just don't let any of the klong water get into your mouth

 

That's unavoidable while taking the river-expressboats.. And i see children swimming in it every day.

 

Also i saw ladies washing morningglory in the klongs downtown bangkok, they will sell it on the market.

 

During the flooding we had to wade through the water every day, it was riverwater....nobody got sick though.

[Stardust314]

[ExpatOilWorker]

A lot of farmers, or at least their daughters, also have a vested interest that Sukhumvit stay dry and operational.