Broad social effort to help rice farmers

CIVIL SOCIETY has united to help farmers during the crisis as rice prices decline, with many people volunteering to assist in selling the crop.
Since a campaign encouraging farmers to sell rice directly to consumers was kicked off by Kasetsart University lecturer Decharut Sukkumnoed last week, the trend has gained traction with many farmers turning to direct sales to end consumers. Meanwhile, people have offered help to farmers with many types of assistance to show their support for producers of the country’s main staple.
For example, Ararat Tanarach, owner of the newly founded rice brand “Comacomi.studio” and a graduate student at the Chiang Mai University Faculty of Architecture, said she wanted to use her knowledge to add value to the crop and help poor farmers to realise higher profits.
Ararat said she had never been involved in selling rice before starting her brand a week ago in response to the plunging price of paddy, but she wanted to help her family and others from her village using her knowledge of product design.
“I noticed that the price is very low compared to its real value. The rice from my village in Lampang’s Hang Chat district is organic and unique from others, because jasmine rice from there is crossbred with sticky rice, so it has more a firm and sticky structure than jasmine rice from other places,” she said.
In addition to emphasising the distinctive nature of Hang Chat rice, she said could further increase the value of the rice by designing handmade packaging and innovative marketing.
“I want customers to regard my product as a high-value handicraft that can be sold at a high price. Most people still think rice is cheap, but it is not. I think rice prices can be boosted if sellers develop their products well,” she said.
Ararat is just one example of people who want to contribute. The Facebook fanpage IDXW has launched a campaign to encourage graphic designers who want to help create brand logos, graphics, banners and packaging to meet farmers who need help. The campaign has received overwhelming responses from both designers and farmers.
One of the designers, Tharissapong Thitiphockawin, owner of IDEADVA graphic design, said he volunteered for free because he wanted to help farmers in their time of need.
“I can imagine how desperate and stressful it is when there is not enough money, so I want to help farmers with my ideas and knowledge so they can have more profit from selling their rice. All of my work for farmers is free because I want to do a good deed for the late King,” Tharissapong said, adding that he had designed logos and packaging for seven farmers already.
Many farmers are selling rice on social media such as Facebook and Line groups, which have become online markets for farmers to advertise and sell their products directly, with customers already utilising new platforms.

Online contracts
Unchalee Sukkaew, an online rice vendor who is also a nurse working in Bangkok, said she had received larger orders from businesses after she advertised her family’s rice from Surin on the Internet.
“Recently I was contacted by a factory owner in Bangkok who ordered two tonnes of rice for lunch for employees. Additionally, a businessman in Phuket also contacted me to order one tonne of rice, and he offered to pay the transportation costs too,” Unchalee said.
Deputy dean at Rangsit University’s College of Social Innovation Suriyasai Katasila said Rangsit had also initiated policies to help farmers and their children who studied at the university.
“Farmers can now pay their children’s fees with paddy. Currently the details are not yet set, but farmers can be sure that the paddy price the university will pay will not be less than the market price,” Suriyasai said.
He said the university also fully supported direct sales by farmers and would open an area in its campus for farmers to sell rice on Thursday and Friday.
However, he said such measures were only preliminary and the government needed to tackle agricultural product prices in the long term.
Former Bank for Agriculture and Agricultural Cooperatives Risk Management Committee head Anusorn Tamajai agreed that direct rice sales could not solve the price problem unless farmers formed cooperatives, which could improve rice prices, although they would not be able to change the national or global markets.
“The direct sales can solve rice price problems on a small scale. I suggest the government should ensure economic fairness and income distribution in the rice industry instead, because the country will be more competitive,” Anusorn said.