Protesting farmers leave Nakhon Ratchasima on foot to Bangkok

[Anonymous Coward]

If this is so, on arrival in Bangkok, a gov-sponsored lecture on how to read a contract from start to finish before signing and handing out free calculators with instructions on how to use them might be of assistance?

And spoil the credit-fueled retail boom?

No, I'm afraid the house of cards will be coming down sooner or later.

[dirtydog]

Protesting farmers continue their march to Bangkok


Nakhon Ratchasima - Some 300 protesting farmers continued their long march from this northeastern to Bangkok Friday morning although a deputy PM's secretary-general met them to hear their grievance Thursday night.

The farmers left Nakhon Ratchasima's Muang district on January 7 with hope to reach Bangkok and camp out in front of Government House by January 19.

They decided to walk to highlight their demand for the government to implement measures to absolve their debt with financial institutions.

The farmers spent Thursday night near Lam Takhong Dam in Nakhon Ratchasima's Si Khiew district where Deputy PM's Secretary-General Surapong Chainam met them.

Prapas Ngoksungnone, president of the Network of Northeastern People, said Friday morning that Surapong could not solve their problems so the farmers decided to move on to Bangkok.

The Nation

[dirtydog]

Farmers are threatening to stage protest in Bangkok




Thousands of farmers from across the country are converging on the capital to demand that the government address their grievances, their representatives said Sunday at a press conference at the Bangkok office of the Campaign for Popular Democracy.


Veerapon Sopa, an adviser to the Network for Thai People, said that about 1,000 farmers from the Northeast were now on their way to Bangkok and hoped to arrive by Friday to ask the government for help.


"They will be joined by farmers from other regions," he said.

Network of Thais for Reconciliation spokesman Warin Attanak added that more than 40,000 grass growers were planning to dump their produce in front of Government House if their leaders' meeting with Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Thira Sutabutra on Wednesday does not yield satisfactory results.


Warin said these farmers had grown a variety of grass required for feed under the "One Million Cattle Project" launched by ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra that has since been abandoned.


"The grass growers want the government to buy the produce from them and they won't grow this variety of grass again," Warin said.

General Saprang Kalayanamitr, an assistant secretary to the Council for National Security, said the farmers would be invited to a meeting at a military compound in Saraburi.

Saprang also called on the government to solve the farmers' problems urgently or else more farmers would join the rallies.


"I know most farmers still like the Thaksin government," Saprang said.


The Nation

[Gerbil]

Network of Thais for Reconciliation spokesman Warin Attanak added that more than 40,000 grass growers were planning to dump their produce

PARTY!!!!

[Marmite the Dog]

"I know most farmers still like the Thaksin government," Saprang said.

Any sympathy I might've had has just disappeared.

[Gerbil]

General Saprang Kalayanamitr, an assistant secretary to the Council for National Security, said the farmers would be invited to a meeting at a military compound in Saraburi.

I bet they will..... Wonder if they'll be allowed to leave?

[dirtydog]

They decided to walk to highlight their demand for the government to implement measures to absolve their debt with financial institutions.

They aint getting no sympathy from me.

[redwood]

I have watched things with rural folks for the last four years in Buri Ram and have several mixed observations about what is happening to them.

When I first arrived at our village, I saw the first glimmer that the government was paying attention to their calls for basic needs, hence earlier notes that the farmers love Takhsin. In the succeeding years, the local govt councils have paved most of the roads in ours and neighboring villages, installed telephone booths, and are in the process of developing a common water piping system in the outlying areas of the Tambon.

According to my wife, in previous elections/governments in Isaan a scattering of people would show up near election day and hand voters 20-100 Baht to secure their votes and that would be the last they would see of government until the next election. Resultant, was an appreciation, long lasting for Thai Rak Thai. People in our area over the course of years have also finally voted out the old bosses who monopolized the government funding for themselves and their immediate families, literally.

Now for the bad part:

Education still lags FAR behind the larger cities' systems. To even get a modest education our daughters and most of the village's children board a truck every morning for a 16km ride to the nearest large town where the schools are acceptable, costing 500 Baht per month per child. The school itself costs another 10,000 Baht per term (@2 terms per year). That is money that about half of the village's people can't come up with. Being charitable, the local elementary school could do better. The children there probably spend 50%+ per day in some form of sports, lunch, or recess. The teachers there probably only instruct less than 3 hours each day and students from up to 3-4 grades are mixed in the three different classrooms, resulting in classes with 45-60 kids. That is not exactly a conducive learning situation.

The above leads back to farmers marching on Bangkok. Being brought up with a less than optimal education, knowing only what their families have down for the last several hundred years, they are prey for all sorts of schemes to 'get rich quick'. If it were just the lottery ticket salespeople it wouldn't be so bad. The banks in the nearby cities have been aggressively 'selling' loans to property owners for the past four years to people who, in any evaluator's right mind, wouldn't qualify for a loan of lunch money.

Standing on the sidelines watching this has been sad. The poor farmers get equity loans equaling 100% of the value of their properly documented property. The repayment schemes are also screwy. They seem to be either quarterly or semi-annual payments with a hefty percentage of the balance being demanded. These same people who made the loans approach us, and every other relatively wealthy person in the village, every two or three months asking for a one week loan, equaling the loan payment (usually in the 10,000-15,000 Baht range), plus a 5 or 10% commission for the person making the short term loan.

The people make the loan payment, wait the obligatory seven day period and then make a withdrawal against the equity loan and pay the short term loan person back with interest. Most villagers here only make in the range of 5-7k Baht per month in the average month and maybe 15-20K during the harvest month. They have no hope of ever truly paying the loan back, hence their perception they are up against the wall and are looking for satisfaction. They want to believe every bank person coming around telling them the bank can help.

The only thing I see is that eventually this is going pyramid to build a series of loans that eventually will not be paid off. Few have the education or forethought to take these loans and apply them to tools to increase their production, serious home improvements, or land holdings. Ninety percent of the people getting the loans, that I see, buy the obligatory 100cc motocy, a bigger TV, and have a blow out party with the usual massive quantities of whiskey consumption. Two years on they have nothing to show. How do they solve this, they don't they appeal to the central govt to bail them out.

Apologies for the long-winded diatribe, but as you can probably tell I have been thinking about this for some time. I have been tempted to skim off some easy money by making these short time loans that people come to us for, but haven't. I pity the farmers, and try (via my wife) to explain to them the fundamental problem. Outside of our immediate relatives, it hasn't had much effect.

[ChiangMai noon]

Apologies for the long-winded diatribe,

don't apologise.
that was an outstanding first hand account that puts a lot of the glib comments to shame.
excellent stuff.

[dirtydog]

Cabinet approves debt-relief measures for farmers


The Cabinet Tuesday approved three debt-relief measures for farmers prompting the cancellation of protests in Bangkok by northeastern farmers.

"Relevant government agencies should have intensified the publicity campaign on work progress to deal with the plight of farmers," Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont said following the Cabinet meeting.

The Agriculture Ministry would dispatch a team of senior officials to explain the debt-relief programme to protesting farmers camping out in Saraburi, Surayud said.

Before the Cabinet review on farm debts, PM's Office Minister Thirapat Serirangsan held a meeting with the protest organisers on Monday in order to convince them not to descend on the capital.

The Nation

[Little Chuchok]

Before the Cabinet review on farm debts, PM's Office Minister Thirapat Serirangsan held a meeting with the protest organisers on Monday in order to convince them not to descend on the capital.

What a bunch of poofs.

[dirtydog]

Farmers end protest march


Legal action against debtors to be delayed

POST REPORTERS
Around 500 northeastern farmers yesterday decided to call off their march on Bangkok after the cabinet agreed to instruct financial institutions and agencies to delay lawsuits against indebted farmers. The farmers set off last week from Nakhon Ratchasima province and were expected to arrive at Government House tomorrow, when they planned to hold a protest against the government's failure to tackle farmers' debt problems.

They reached Saraburi province, about 100km from Bangkok, on Monday night, but their procession was met by assistant army chief Gen Saprang Kalayanamitr, Prime Minister's Office Minister Thirapat Serirangsan and senior representatives of local authorities.

The officials promised to delay lawsuits against indebted farmers, suspend the takeover of assets placed as collateral by farmers failing to pay back their debts, and withhold public auctions of collateral seized from the farmers.

The authorities also agree to instruct the Office of the Farmers Rehabilitation and Development Fund to convince farmers' creditors, including banks, financial institutions, and other juristic entities, to abide by a previously signed memorandum of understanding.

Under the agreement, signed in September, nine banks agreed to sell their loans to the government-run Farmers Rehabilitation and Development Fund, halve farmers' principal loans and waive all interest for loans under one million baht.

The deal covers around 3,500 indebted farmers whose assets are being seized.

Gen Saprang's delegation also agreed to instruct the fund management to find sustainable solutions for indebted farmers and help them generate more income.

The cabinet yesterday approved the measures the delegation promised to the farmers, who later agreed to disperse.

Mr Thirapat insisted that the government was sincerely helping indebted farmers and would set up a special committee to follow up on the progress of the matter.

Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Thira Sutabutra said there were currently a total of 8,000 farmers facing lawsuits.

But of these, only 4,000 farmers were qualified to receive state assistance.

All of the debts created by these 4,000 farmers should be completely transferred to the Farmers Rehabilitation and Development Fund bythe end of this month, he said.

The remaining farmers were not eligible for the aid scheme as their debts were not caused by their agricultural practices, or worth more than a million baht.

At least the takeover of assets of all the 8,000 farmers would be delayed, said Mr Thira.

The minister also undertook to improve the farmers' income-generating capability so that they would be able to repay their debts eventually.
Praphas Ngoksungnoen, a representative of the protesting farmers, said that the farmers agreed to disperse after Gen Saprang gave them his word that he would help.

Bangkok Post

[dirtydog]

500 farmers rally at Lumpini Park


About 500 farmers gathered at the Lumpini Park early Thursday morning to camp out and rally to demand the government to tackle their debt.

The farmers led by Preecha Kaewnam, Chidchai Kesornkaew and Charin Duangdara, arrived at the park at 4 am in buses and other vehicles.

They are members of the Network for Solving of Thai Farmers' Debt.

They called on the government to hold election of farmer representatives in the Farmers Rehabilitation Fund and called on the government to punish the permanent-secretary for Agriculture for allegedly ignoring their debt problem.

The Nation

[dirtydog]

Indebted farmers rally at Royal Plaza

bangkokpost.com

About 500 farmers have been gathering in front of the Royal Plaza since 8 a.m. today to demand the government to solve their debt problem.

The farmers who arrived in buses and pick-up trucks represent the so-called debt network. They also urge the agriculture minister to investigate the agriculture permanent secretary for what they charges as the latter's failure to solve their debt problem.

The protesting farmers claimed that since the agriculture permanent secretary was appointed to head a panel charged with holding talks with indebted farmers to solve the debt problem, only a few officials were sent to see them and formal talks on debt settlement are yet to commence.

About 100 policemen from Dusit police station have been despatched to the protest site to maintain peace and order.

[Gerbil]

^ So the ones who couldnt be arsed to march and got the bus, didnt get the message that it had been called off yesterday, or what?