Inspections of government rice warehouses in Chonburi found no evidence of corruption, although stockpiles of the 2012 crop had turned yellow.
Wasiwa Sasitsmit of the Ministry of Interior, and Lt. Col. Charlie Witsiri from the 14th Military Circle, and the 4th Rice Inspection Team of the National Council for Peace and Order descended on the Sahakol Chonburi warehouse in Muang District July 7.
The samples were divided into three bags of white rice and four bags of jasmine rice, then checked to ensure the rice was the same batch pledged under the rice-pledging scheme.
Wasiwa said the warehouse owner had complied fully with inspectors and although the quality of the rice has deteriorated, there was no evidence the rice had been swapped with that originally purchased from farmers through the Yingluck government’s “rice-pledging” scheme.
To ensure the rice was the same batch pledged under the rice-pledging scheme, samples were collected from the 15th sack from the top in random piles selected by the military officials.
The samples were then divided into three bags of white rice and four bags of jasmine rice. One of each kind will be kept at the Public Warehouse Organization and the rest of the samples were sent to the laboratory in Bangkok for DNA and quality tests.
The warehouse, one of five in Chonburi used in the government scheme, currently stocks 28,204 sacks of 5 percent white rice and 168,664 sacks of A1 super broken rice.
