Small-plot farmers need long-term solutions

He gives the government credit for global prices of Thai rice going up – but droughts this year in the US and India have severely affected those two countries’ rice output, and both are major rice exporters (the US exported 2,900 metric tonnes; India exported 3,000, versus our 8,000; source: Nationmaster.com). Given that prices for Thai 5 per cent white rice have risen by only 11 per cent vis-a-vis last year’s prices, the drought alone would have accounted for much of the rise.

Presumably the government wants to aid the poorer farmers – not those who are already wealthy. Thus, we should measure the extent to which income of low-income farm families rose – not the income of any farmer, regardless of financial standing. 

To measure the success of any programme, we have to compare the costs versus benefits – not just look at the gains. PM Yingluck now has 11.37 million tonnes of rice that she is unwilling to sell at market prices. What is the cost of storage, including spoilage? The US Department of Agriculture forecasts that for the first time in decades, Thailand will no longer be the world’s largest rice exporter, and rice exports over the first half of 2012 are down by 45 per cent vis-a-vis the same period last year, with export values dropping by 35 per cent.

Instead of superficial, non-sustainable fixes like the rice scheme, PM Yingluck would be far more worthy of praise if she focused on long-term, sustainable solutions. For example, our rice productivity badly trails anybody worth mentioning; we’re now in 21st place in the world, behind Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, the Philippines, India, and Myanmar, not to mention advanced countries like the US and Australia (source: Nationmaster.com). Boosting productivity by even 10 per cent a year would be a real achievement that would truly help the poor who support her and her brother come hell or high water.

Burin Kantabutra

Bangkok