Finally we have the vision to solve rice crisis, but do we have the courage?

[Brer Fox]

5 hours ago, ddavidovsky said:

 

Not too convinced about your glowing appraisal of Vietnam. Some academic sources would help.

Vietnam also has one of the most restrictive presses in the world. When things go wrong we just don't hear about it.

 

Regarding pesticide use, a quick enquiry immediately revealed this papar: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.njas.2013.09.001.  Abstract as follows.

 

"Vietnam is facing serious challenges with respect to the amount and toxicity of the pesticides used. With hardly any domestic pesticides production, Vietnam experienced an exponential growth of both the quantity and the value of imported pesticides in recent years. And the increasing import of newly formulated (and safer) pesticides has not replaced or reduced the highly toxic pesticides with low efficacy. The improper use of pesticides by farmers (too high dosages, cocktailing of pesticides, inadequate pre-harvest intervals etc.) has further contributed to the environmental and health problems resulting from pesticides, especially in poorer areas where farmers have to largely rely on cheap but often old and more toxic pesticides. Despite a growth in pesticide policies and regulation, the state has been unable to regulate the pesticide market. The main causes behind the state failure in pesticide market regulation are the governance structure (i.e., centralized decision making), large corruption, information distortion and a failing legal system. To some extent, and in some more wealthy areas, famers and retailers have emerged successfully as new pesticide governance actors. But an overall improvement of pesticide registration and pesticide use can only rely on better government intervention: more stringent implementation and enforcement of regulations, more effective promotion of IPM-based pest control, further public participation in implementation and higher ethics within government."

 

 

A quick check of this website also comes out with this story about Thailand's use of pesticides. 

 

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S146290111100195X

 

"As an agricultural country and one of the world's major food exporters, Thailand relies heavily on the use of pesticides to protect crops and increase yields. During the past decade, the Kingdom of Thailand has experienced an approximate four-fold increase in pesticide use. This increase presents a challenge for the Royal Thai Government in effectively managing and controlling pesticide use based upon the current policies and legal infrastructure. We have reviewed several key components for managing agricultural pesticides in Thailand. One of the main obstacles to effective pesticide regulation in Thailand is the lack of a consolidated, uniform system designed specifically for pesticide management. This deficit has weakened the enforcement of existing regulations, resulting in misuse/overuse of pesticides, and consequently, increased environmental contamination and human exposure. This article provides a systematic review of how agricultural pesticides are regulated in Thailand. In addition, we provide our perspectives on the current state of pesticide management, the potential health effects of widespread, largely uncontrolled use of pesticides on the Thai people and ways to improve pesticide management in Thailand."

 

The above is pretty much a copy of your selective choice about Vietnam.

I suspect the same report could be written for just about every country in Asia. 

[Kasset Tak]

4 hours ago, wayned said:

I disagree with you, the farmers can and will grow other crops when forced to.  I live in Nakhon Sawan Province in farm country.  The major crops that we grow are corn and sugar cane, I grow both.  We have a small Coop and I bought and imported three used John Deere Combines from the US.  We harvest, store and dry our own crops of corn but also truck these combines to Uthai Thanni and Chinat Provinces to harvest corn.  This corn there is being grown on reclaimed rice paddies.  A couple of years ago the government cut off water access to irrigate the land so the farmers had a choice, either let the land go or plant another crop, which they did.  One of the problems is that preparation and planting of corn requires different tools than rice.  Most, if not all of the farmers,  have reached their credit limits with the BAAC so there's no available money.  If the government paid the farmers not to grow the rice up front, there would be some money available and they could grow other crops like the ones in these Provinces that were forced to by the lack of water.  Policing would still be an issue but it would keep the price up without having to buy, store and somehow/sometime dispose of the extra rice!

 

I'm American and we have been doing it this way for as long as I can remember!

What I have sen so far is that most farmers here are really unwilling to change. I talked to rice farmers during the last drought when the government told them to grow other crops than rice, frankly they just said that they could not/didn't know how to grow other crops as they where rice farmers.

I worked on a research project about crop rotation here in Thailand where basically 80% was back in to their old way of farming a single crop after 3 years, not because it was more expensive but because they had to work more.

The same with animals farms, I have 6 friends running different animal farms with one thing in common; they all buy their feed instead of growing it themselves.

 

I grew up on a small farm and we didn't have enough land to grow all we needed so basically we bought 50% of the feed and grains we needed from neighbors and local producers but we prepared 90-95% of the feed ourselves (rolled oats we had to buy as we didn't have a mill for that). Here in Thailand I see farmers going 200km to buy ready made feed for 10-25Baht a kg when they could grow the grain themselves or buy grain from their neighbors for 5-10baht and prepare the feed themselves.

 

And yes, there are farmers (and teachers) that has adapted new ways of thinking but many are still stuck in the same path and don't accept research, new technics and  new technology that come from outside Thailand!

Another problem that I have seen so many times here is that if someone see that the neighbor do something that they earn good money on then they just copy that and in the end the bottom goes out of the market... in the village I used to live they built a block of shop-houses, first month a hairdresser opened in one end of the block, the second month another hairdresser opened in the other end and the third month there was a third hairdresser... now there are no hairdressers there as there is not enough people living in the area to support 3 hairdressers!  

 

BTW. I have friends growing sugarcane in Nakorn Sawan, Kamphaeng Phet, Pithsanulok and Sukhothai and they have all been complaining the last couple of years that the price has gone down/stand still while their costs has gone up... that is because now more farmers are growing sugarcane then when they started growing sugarcane some 15-20 years ago.

 

[BuriramDevelopers]

What a great world we live in , were people die of hunger , and other people are poor because of oversuply of food in their sector.....???

[stephen tracy]

6 hours ago, adhd said:

make every farang that wants an extention to buy 100 kg of rice at 19 baht per kilogram

 

hehe, same price as the extention

 

 

why can japanese make WINE (sake) out of rice but not thai people?  time for a new export product

 

Although this made me chuckle, it's not such a bad idea. 

[jerojero]

What a great world we live in , were people die of hunger , and other people are poor because of oversuply of food in their sector.....???

True, but welcome to international economics. Have and have-nots been around among people and countries since beginning of time. Problem lies within the too many world leaders who are simply selfish and greedy.

[Reigntax]

11 hours ago, sungod said:

Thailand is an upper middle income country, maybe rice is not the crop they should be growing, or at least in the manner its produced.

 

Just saw the post above as I was posting, couldn't agree more.

 

What?.

 

Thailand is a third world country or as the politically correct call it, a developing country. The majority of people live below the poverty line. It is abused by an incompetent military to benefit a minority and will continue to be so for many decades while the rest of Asia progresses.

 

Thailands days and a chance to be an Asian leader have gone and were wasted away by the military, politicians and almost every government department that abused the country for self gain.

 

If BKK airport wasnt on a convienent route for refueling and stopovers it would be a backwater slum that nobody could care less about. Its a country in denial and without the capability to deal with the real problems and the only direction is backwards into the abyss.

[Jonmarleesco]

17 hours ago, webfact said:

'... including tips on how ordinary citizens can help.'

Apart from the few million taxpayers who already are involuntarily helping, why would the public want to help push up the price of something that is - and should be - dictated by market forces? If the government thinks the price needs to go up, they need to try reducing production instead of subsidising it, while educating farmers in diversifying into commodities that are actually in demand.

[Srikcir]

2 hours ago, stephen tracy said:

Although this made me chuckle, it's not such a bad idea. 

10 countries brew sake including Thailand. The US and China are the top producers.

The 5 best Sake in the world are NOT made in Japan.

http://www.sake-talk.com/best-sake-in-the-world/

 

 

[wayned]

I used to buy Sake made in Thailand by the case from the local Ma and Pa store,couldn't just buy 1 bottle, but I think that I was the only one that bought it and she stopped stocking it.  I can't remember the name. It was Okay!

[ClutchClark]

1 minute ago, wayned said:

I used to buy Sake made in Thailand by the case from the local Ma and Pa store,couldn't just buy 1 bottle, but I think that I was the only one that bought it and she stopped stocking it.  

 

I know just what you mean, "I could never just drink one beer."