Farmers across the agrarian heartland that makes Thailand the world's second-largest rice exporter should be poised to benefit. These pressures on the sector, reported in detail for the first time by Reuters, are squeezing debt-laden Thai farmers despite tens of billions of dollars in subsidies over the past decade. Successive governments have spent 1.2 trillion Thai baht ($33.85 billion) on price and income interventions for rice farmers in the last decade, estimates Somporn. The average Thai farmer's income has dwindled. Unstable income for Thai rice farmersIn the years since Sripai followed her family into the paddy fields, the challenges have multiplied, but current prices offer a rare opportunity.

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Persons: Somporn, Sripai, Danai Saengthabthim, Srettha Thavisin, King Chulalongkorn, Nipon Poapongsakorn, Thailand's, KNIT's, Yingluck Shinawatra, Yingluck, Devjyot Ghoshal, Pasit, Katerina Ang, Kay Johnson Organizations: Farmers, Reuters, Research, Knowledge Network Institute of Thailand, Bank for Agriculture, Agricultural Cooperatives, Agriculture, El, National Water Resources, Thailand Development Research, Nipon, Thomson Locations: Thailand, Kaeo, Chai, India, East, Asia, Africa, Rice, Chai Nat, Bangkok, Bangladesh, Nepal, Vietnam