About 19,000 jasmine rice farmers in the Northeast have 20% higher incomes after joining the five-year Market-Oriented Smallholders Value Chain (MSVC) Thailand project supported by Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) and its partners.
The project, which ran from 2018 to 2022, introduced the sustainable rice platform's standards and sustainable practices to enhance the skills and knowledge of farmers, said Apichart Pongsrihadulchai, an adviser to the director-general of the Rice Department and a former director-general of the department.
Funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), the project is a joint venture of GIZ, the Rice Department, Olam Agri and Crop Life International.
Mr Apichart said the result was impressive as up to 19,000 smallholder farmers in the northeastern region including Ubon Ratchathani and Surin have managed to increase their net income by 20% while reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 21% on average.
Of the total, 8,600 were certified according to the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP) introduced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and GIZ in 2011.
Udon Kamwongsa, a farmer who joined the project in 2019, said she believed in producing safe food for her family and consumers.
"We also eat rice that we grow. We would like consumers to be confident that the rice they eat is of the same quality, safety and sustainability standard, wherever it's marketed," she said.
Ms Udon said training and activities under the project enabled her to learn skills and practices that she could apply to her family's rice land plots in Ubon Ratchathani province.
She said that when she joined the project, there were fewer than 100 members but when the project was completed last week, that had grown to 19,000 members, reflecting the eagerness of farmers to be part of the sustainable market-oriented value chain and expand access to jasmine rice in new global markets.
MSVC Thailand Project Director Atthawit Watcharapongchai said most rice producers in Thailand are small-scale farmers with about 20 rai (3.2 hectares) of farmland.
They are in a weak position in the supply chain due to a lack of access to knowledge, technical advice, quality farm inputs and a fair rice market, let alone the export market, Mr Atthawit said.
Farmers joining the project are encouraged to adopt key farming techniques including knowledge to lower greenhouse gas emissions, use tailor-made fertiliser, stop burning rice straw and practise Integrated Pest Management.
"The techniques can enable members of local communities to reduce not only costs but also chemical use in rice farming, while improving soil quality and stabilising the ecosystem,'' Mr Atthawit said.
Narawadee Modenuch, Sustainability Manager of Olam Agri, a food and agri-business with its headquarters in Singapore, said the project also promoted development of long-term business relationships between farmers, processors and retailers.
Under the MSVC Thailand project, Olam Agri contributed its expertise in international supply chains, rice processing, and data collection.
GIZ was able to contribute its experience and networks from other rice projects in Thailand.
The project also supported finding markets for up to 160,000 tonnes of jasmine rice produced under sustainable rice platform standards.
"This project has enabled us to make our entire rice value chain more sustainable," she said.
