BANGKOK, 19 August 2011 – Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs and Commerce Minister Kittirat Na Ranong is adamant that the rice mortgaging scheme will help improve the financial status of farmers.
While giving a lecture concerning the direction of Thai trade in the new decade, Mr Kittirat pointed out that the Government had assigned the Commerce Ministry to take charge of three major economic policies, which were the reduction of people’s cost of living, exports and crop mortgaging.
In order to bring down the soaring living expenses, the Deputy Prime Minister said the Ministry would examine the production processes of goods with fluctuating prices so that it could assess their production costs and solve problems in a systematic way. For exports, the Ministry has set a target to push Thailand to become the production and distribution hub of ASEAN and also to help the sector expand by 20 percent.
Meanwhile, Mr Kittirat insisted that the rice pledging scheme, which would offer 15,000 THB for each ton of paddy, would be able to increase income for farmers and improve their living conditions. He assured the public not to worry about a looming rice price increase as a result of the mortgaging scheme, saying appropriate measures had been prepared to cushion the impact.
