Soft loans urged for rice farmers

Thai Agriculturalists Association president Suthep Kongmark said small farmers needed soft loans to invest in rice production.
The government launched the plantation-integration project to encourage small farmers to integrate their rice fields to lower their production costs.Each farmer will need about Bt100,000 in loans to increase their financial liquidity, Suthep said.
Chutima Bunyapraphasara, permanent secretary of the Commerce Ministry, said the government would need to discuss the rice farmers’ proposal and decide whether to approve a budget for helping them.

Cutting costs
She said the government would continue to help lower costs of production by calling for fertiliser, pesticide, and seed traders to reduce their price for farmers.
The Interior Ministry will also help by urging landowners to reduce rental fees for farmers.
The Commerce Ministry’s working committee to formulate a national rice strategy foresees that rice production this year could be 8 per cent higher than the previous expectation of about 25 million tonnes of paddy, increasing to 27 million tonnes.
Of that 27 million tonnes, about 115 million tonnes would be paddy white rice, 7 million tonnes jasmine rice, 7.1 million tonnes sticky rice, 1 million tonnes Pathum Thani rice, and the remaining 100,000 tonnes other grains such as organic and speciality rice.
Meanwhile, the Internal Trade Department will soon hold talks with tyre manufacturers in an effort to persuade them to reduce their prices following the lower cost of rubber.
Wiboonlasana Ruamraksa, director-general of the department, said the price of rubber tyres could be reduced by another 35 per cent after the price was already decreased by 15 per cent last year.
Moreover, retail prices of 11 products will soon decrease by 1.6-25 per cent on lower oil prices.