The heartbreak of being a Thai farmer

[glalt]

My wife is a farmer. She had a beautiful standing rice crop. She was very proud of her rice paddies. Most rice here in Loei is still planted and harvested totally by hand. As you can imagine, it is very hard backbreaking work. Unlike some areas of Thailand that get more than one crop per year, here in Loei because of the normally too dry of weather, they get just one crop a year.

Now in just a couple of days, wind and unseasonable heavy rain has laid her rice crop flat on the ground and underwater. Needless to say she is heartbroken. Many small farmers will suffer greatly from this disaster. Fortunately it is not the end of the world for my wife because she has me so life here goes on normally.

[AlexO]

Have to agree with you wholeheartedly, Glait. When I first moved up to Issan (Udon Province)we decided to turn 15 Rai of basically scrub land that belonged to wife's mother into rice paddy. Not including what it cost to prepare the land works, the amount of work required to obtain a half decent crop far outweighs any financial gains from the crop. We stopped after 3 years when I finally convinced the wife that we were far better off just buying what we need from the actual farmers or Tesco. How the everyday Thai farmer survives I have no idea especially given the risks such as you highlighted.

[Doodoo]

This train of thought not only applies for farmers here in Thailand but for farmers all over the world
Canada
https://www.farms.com/ag-industry-news/ ... e-836.aspx
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Sas ... _281415723

Saskatchewan the bread basket of Canada As one can see a farm has grown from 500 acres in the 1950's to 1668 acres now in the 2020's You would think the farmer would be in his glory but with costs increasing dramatically, so forget it

As I explained to the wife when her family bought a so called farm of 13 rai (5.2 acre) "You aint getting rich"
I asked here to name one rich farmer. None. But then asked how many people who sold tractors, fertilizer etc were doing well. Kubota, John Deere, Monsanto, Cargill...

[FrazeeDK]

how does the average Thai farmer survive?
- most have some skill in construction or handyman labor so during the off season they earn cash that way.
- Some have other livestock; cows, water buffalo, chicken, ducks, hogs, that are a source of protein as well as sold to earn cash.
- The tons of rice they harvest off their land, at least my relatives, goes into the elevated rice barn as food and as an ermgency cash reservoir.
- most have family members working either overseas or down country here in Thailand who send home several thousand baht a month.
- many live a parsimonious lifestyle not requiring much cash. Going out fishing, harvesting jungle food, or growing off season crops (corn, beans, cucumbers, tomatoes) provides food and a small amount of cash.
- One observation I've made, although it is changing, is a lot of country people don't put value on their time and labor in their fields. Spending days and hours in stoop labor, tending vegetable crops, tending livestock isn't seen as "wasted" time from the western perspective, That's just the way it is.. But, as I said, its changing. Younger folks aren't willing to live that lifestyle if they can find an alternative.

[glalt]

Double post ????

[glalt]

I fondly remember the old days. My grandfather raised 6 children sharecropping 40 acres. He made a little extra money with an ancient threshing machine. It ran off a belt powered by an old John Deere tractor that still had the original steel wheels. He had a fruit orchard and his own smoke house.That family was nearly self sufficient. He had a flock of chickens for meat as well as eggs. Every fall there was a big gathering of family members canning fruit, vegetables and meat. It was actually a production line. I was a feather plucker. The old chickens past their prime were butchered and canned. He had several milk cows for milk and butter.When they got too old, they were butchered and mostly canned. a few pigs including an old sow who usually had 6 piglets every year.. Certain cuts of the pork were smoked and the rest also canned. They also made their own soap. I knew there wasn't much money but the family lived pretty well and never went hungry. He always had a few extra pigs to sell. He had an old dog named Sporty. He would tell Sporty to go get the cows at milking time. Sporty came up missing for a couple days. There was a railroad about a half mile from the house. That was during the days when locomotives were still coal fired. The engineer for that train was a friend who stopped by the house and told grandpa that old Sporty got hit by the train and told Grandpa where he buried the old dog. Grandpa went and dug up old Sporty and took his collar off. That collar was hung in the machine shop until Grandpa died. I am now 78 years old and remember those old happy days very well.

[pipoz4444]

Have to agree with you wholeheartedly, Glait. When I first moved up to Issan (Udon Province)we decided to turn 15 Rai of basically scrub land that belonged to wife's mother into rice paddy. Not including what it cost to prepare the land works, the amount of work required to obtain a half decent crop far outweighs any financial gains from the crop. We stopped after 3 years when I finally convinced the wife that we were far better off just buying what we need from the actual farmers or Tesco. How the everyday Thai farmer survives I have no idea especially given the risks such as you highlighted.

We continue to plant the rice more for fun and because the family still seems to have a connection to the land, with their parents having grown up on it in harder times, 40 odd years ago. I suspect it was a lot less affluent that it is now, in places such as Udon Thani, back in 1980's.

As to how the Thai farmer in more rural area survives, he struggles, but I think it is because he simply has lower expectations in his lifestyle than Thai's in the city type areas and certainly a lot less than us. Some Thai's simply don't have options, even these days. Plus many Thai's just seem happy to get by day to day without too much thought about their longer term futures.

Still they can be the nicest, least selfish people. Worth a thought

pipoz4444

[JR]

We run a Kubota rice harvester. This year it is difficult due to the rains drenching most fields. This makes the work difficult because of the mushy ground and it takes much longer. Also some of the rice is wasted because of combines run by incompetent drivers. Not for us though. But price is not increased, we get the same as last year, 1000 baht pr rai for wet and/or horizontal rice and 800 pr rai for normal dry fields. And this is not enough for the increased number of work hours needed now. We use more diesel.

[AlexO]

We run a Kubota rice harvester. This year it is difficult due to the rains drenching most fields. This makes the work difficult because of the mushy ground and it takes much longer. Also some of the rice is wasted because of combines run by incompetent drivers. Not for us though. But price is not increased, we get the same as last year, 1000 baht pr rai for wet and/or horizontal rice and 800 pr rai for normal dry fields. And this is not enough for the increased number of work hours needed now. We use more diesel.

I think that was the point I was trying to make JR. These poor people can spend real money on increasing production and Mother Nature in one day can destroy the harvest. Speaking to a Thai rice farmer today, he's a happy bunny. Best yield for 3 years. But sometimes they don't look at production costs. I suppose 'live for the minute' is how we evolved.

[pipoz4444]

Just finished harvesting.

Absolutely no money in it, just doing for the fun and family + friends gathering sort of thing (eat & drink piss)

Normally get about 24 Bags per Rai, and give 90% of it away If one crop per year is the best that the Udon Thani Thai farmers can hope for and 24 Bags per Rai is the norm up there, then the UT Thai farmers do it hard.

After the cost of harvesting, bagging, drying, milling and labour, there is not much left over for the Thai farmer to spend.

pipoz4444

[JR]

So far we have done about 52 bags pr rai.

[rick]

24 bags per.rai? I wish! We harvested our one rai field, got 3 bags. It is organic with no chemical fertiliser. Just aboit paid for the Kubota harvester. Not the ploughing. At least didn't need to irrigate this year. The soil is very acid, possibly salty) hardly.anything will grow there except coarse grasses. Have tried bananas, many fruit trees, pumpkins, maize, nothing works.
I want to turn it back into a pond, fish will.grow very slowly (3 years to get something edible.size) but at least maintenance costs are low. Of course, Thai family think they know best, because farmers ( they think).

Family do have 2 other rice paddies, but one is very low lying and flooded all year round, so rarely used, other is rented out but got flooded this year so no income. Scratching a living if not for farang ....

[glalt]

We run a Kubota rice harvester. This year it is difficult due to the rains drenching most fields. This makes the work difficult because of the mushy ground and it takes much longer. Also some of the rice is wasted because of combines run by incompetent drivers. Not for us though. But price is not increased, we get the same as last year, 1000 baht pr rai for wet and/or horizontal rice and 800 pr rai for normal dry fields. And this is not enough for the increased number of work hours needed now. We use more diesel.

I asked my wife why she doesn't hire a rice harvester. She said the worst thing is that they are seldom available when conditions are just right. If the rice is too dry, there is a large loss and if it is too wet, drying it is difficult and sometimes expensive. Also frequently the rice is blown down and flattened and even more is lost. Even now as in the past, rice paddies are too small to make the harvester easy and efficient to use. Farmers usually plant every square centimeter of the paddy. Also many who own harvesters are not able to properly maintain the machines. Things constantly need adjustments, things wear out. Hired operators are not skilled enough to maintain those machines.

[tamada]

... Also many who own harvesters are not able to properly maintain the machines. Things constantly need adjustments, things wear out. Hired operators are not skilled enough to maintain those machines.

This being Isaan, that attitude is easy to accept. They park it up for half-a-year with little or no preventative maintenance and instead of buying genuine spare parts, they 'afro-engineer' the thing when it starts to fall apart.