Farm prices, competitiveness key areas of focus for new ministers

Agriculture Minister Krisada Boonrat said he was not sure whether key farm produce, including rubber and rice, were affected by politics, but what is certain is their plunging prices are a problem for farmers.
The ministers said they would help one another to lift the prices of farm produce, especially rubber, within their first three months in office.
Measures and planning to stabilise the prices and ensure farm competitiveness and security would be their long-term focus, he said.
“It’s always our farmers’ problems – they grow rubber, rice and so on and lose profits. The challenge is how we can stop such an endless cycle,” said Krisada.
Deputy Agriculture Minister Luck Wajananawat said farm cooperatives or groupings need to be strengthened to improve farm competitiveness and security.
Farmers should have tools to help regulate their produce and increase competitiveness, including their own silos as well as community-based business. 
Negotiation power, he said, should be drawn back from merchants and put in farmers’ hands.
Wiwat Salyakamthorn, another deputy minister, said he was assigned to help handle fundamental infrastructure including irrigation. Wiwat said he would adopt His Majesty the late King Rama IX’s royal projects and guidance to the ministry’s work, including irrigation, especially for those outside the irrigated area.
The Kok Nong Na Model is his famed water management model adapted from the late King, under which sources of water are linked to hilly forests and fields, which help sustain the whole system.