Comments on: The joys of baby corn

By: Benchaphun Ekasingh

Benchaphun Ekasingh — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 09:41:12 +0000

Just to clarify. The 2500 baht is per crop per rai. This does not seem a lot but this already takes into account the labor costs of peeling the husk– a process which creates a lot of employment and income in the villages–as it is done by kg at 1.50-2.00 baht a kg of peeled baby corn. Some workers earn 200 baht a day peeling the baby corn.

By: Benchaphun Ekasingh

Benchaphun Ekasingh — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 09:34:39 +0000

We have done studies on farmers’ conditions in a small watershed called Mae Tha in Lamphun in 2008 and found that growing baby corn was considered by farmers one of their best cash crops in the past 10 years or so. It has reliable market, stable prices, low pests and disease, easy to grow, short duration (45 days) and crop residue can be sold and used in dairy farming. They can grow 3 crops in the rainy season, another 3 crops in the dry season, getting a net income of 2500 baht per rai (comparable to other crops). Most farmers would have around 1 ha of land, about half being paddy land. Some farmers would get more profit if they would go organic. Labour inputs are around 28 mandays per crop per rai (around 80-90 baht per man day but can be 200+ if they grow organic baby corn). Nevertheless, increasing fertilizer costs together with stagnant prices of the output are eroding the profitability of the crop.

I hope this helps you, Andrew.

By: antipadshist

antipadshist — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:39:08 +0000

I second nganadeeleg

I’d also like to know the answers to questions he raised

interesting post.

perhaps eventually some academics or invesstigative journalists would make some study of all such matters – how much actually all the middlemen take.

note the recent article (on Bkk Post?) that now rice exporters give pressure to Abhisit.

By: John Hawkins

John Hawkins — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:54:52 +0000

A few months ago there was a story on Thai TV news regarding the plight of corn farmers who had been left with a glut of harvested product but no buyer. It seems that the usual Thai buyers had contracted to buy this year’s harvests from Myanmar instead! Furthermore, this latter arrangement had been set up by a past Minister for Agriculture during her term in Mr. Thaksin’s first government.

I have not seen this in English anywhere; my wife helped me to understand the story when it aired on the news.

Does anyone have any further information on this?

By: Jean-Philippe Leblond

Jean-Philippe Leblond — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:12:19 +0000

Assuming 5 crops per year, the 2000-3000B/rai/crop = 2500*5 = 12 500B/rai/year , which about the same level as that reported in Thippawal Srijantr ’s case study in the Mae Klong area c 1997 (not contract farming however).

I thought I had a copy of his thesis but can’t find it. Anyways, in “Profitability and yield gap of sugar cane cultivation in the Mae Klong region” (http://std.cpc.ku.ac.th/delta/deltacp/pubs/sugarcane.PDF ) he says ” Comparing the annual income with other crops and animal productions, it was found that sugar cane yielded less than double rice crops (2,600 baht per rai per year with sell price of 1997 : 3,400 baht/ton ; since then, prices have fluctuated between 5,000 and 8,000 baht/rai), but three times less than baby corn production and five times less than raising diary cows is association with baby corn (Srijantr,
1998). ” p. 3
If we use 5000B /yr as a mean profitability of sugar cane: 5000 *3 = 15000B/rai/year for baby corn.

You’re right that 50B/day is low compared to the min wage of 150B or more. On the other hand, it is much better than what I’ve seen in upland conditions, namely risking loosing 20 000+ B /year in feed maize production, a debt that is all but impossible to reimburse for the typical family without getting wage revenues.
I wonder how many crops aside from rubber can get you a reliable income greater than the minimum wage in Thailand. Outside irrigated areas, my guess is none.

By: nganadeeleg

nganadeeleg — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 09:49:51 +0000

I know nothing about the financial aspects of growing that or any other crop, but I would also be interested to know about the respective relative proportions of the final sale price that is recieved by the middlemen, processors, exporters, importers etc , and how that compares to the farmers/labourers share, and how that compares to other crops in Thailand, and to the situation in other exporting nations.

Some quick summary numbers would be interesting, if you have them handy.