2009 Rubber Planting in Thailand

Supote SiriarayaChiangmai Provincial Director

Office of the Rubber Replanting Aid Fund(ORRAF)24 June 2009

Panel 1 : smallholder rubber plantations dynamics and policies to support them

Recent ORRAF Data

• Total rubber production: 3.09 million metric tons in 2008

• Rubber planting area: 2.28 million hectares

• Rubber planting owner:more than 11 million

• 95% are small holders

To strengthen capacities of rubber planters, we….

• provide technical assistance• help allocate funds• help planters sell

• provide related information

We transfer knowledge, guidelines and advice to rubber planters on technology deployment for quality planting

1. Through our rubber replanting officers in the regional offices

-Group advice

-Individual consultation

Technical Assistance

2. Through training

- 52817 small-holders will be trained in various areas such as tapping, budding and disease control

3. Exhibition and mobile rubber clinics in local areas

Technical Assistance (con.)

Technical Assistance (con.)• During 1962 and 2007,ORRAF has given aids to replanting

up to 9.2 million Rai (1.472million hectare)

• 93% of these assisted are replanting with high quality rubber plants

• 7% are rubber planting with perennial plants to support the government policies

We ensure that we provide high quality rubber plants to re-planters in the project

by…

1.Cultivating high yield planting materials in our nurseries (5%)

2. Supporting self provision of high quality planting materials (80%) by providing lists of RRIT’s quality controlled private nurseries

3. Providing planting materials from ORRAF cooperative small holders’ groups and other reliable sources to rubber re-planters (15%)

3532 Nurseries with

-1009 hectares of Budwood

- 367 hectares of Stock

Private Nurseries approved by RRIT in 2009providing quality planting materials

Fund Allocation

• Those replanting farmers joining the program will get 11,000 Baht/Rai (divided to 13 payments within 5 years). The fund comes from rubber exporters, calculated as 1.40Baht per 1 kg. of rubber exported.

• Those in the North and Northeast joining the “New Planting to Increase Revenues and Stability Project” will get 90 rubbers in polybags per Rai (not to exceed 30 Rais). They can also get loans from the Bank of Agriculture and Agriculture cooperative

To help planters sell,• We inform planters of current rubber price through

local radios ,TV, SMS, call center and website.

• Our regional offices will organize local rubber auctions where planters can meet directly with buyers and get reasonable price.

Information Providing

• Local radios• TV programs• www.rubber.co.th• Leaflets ,brochures• Regional offices