Organic farming network, Northeast Thailand
Prof Sawaeng Ruaysoongnern, Khon Kaen University, Thailand.

Human health has been an important issue with respect to rural communities in Thailand since 1961 when the government initiated a development plan to address this problem. The severity of the problem, however, became abundantly clearer in the early 1970’s when health services were not able to cope with the demands of rural communities. A group of farmers in Yasothon province in 1973 decided to address this issue by taking responsibility for their own.

The first stage of this process was moving away from modern medicines to the collection of traditional herbal medicines from a large numbers of plant species. With assistance of non-government organization, they began to examine critical their whole livelihood system and to plan options to address the problems they were faced with. Through a process of self analysis and discussion of possible options to improve their livelihoods, the group decided that the growing of organic rice would be a viable option to address their problems. Farmers initiated production of organic rice in the 1980s.

Initially the growing of organic rice (Jasmine) due criticism and opposition from the Government sector as it was thought to be a threat to overall rice production in the Kingdom. With time this resistance declined due to the persistence of the farmers and organic rice growing is accepted as an important component in Thailand’s rice exports. The adoption of organic rice technologies have developed and expand throughout communities within the province. Associated with the concept of organic rice growing, activities promoting the protection of forest resources, water and natural ecosystem rehabilitation have been widely disseminated. The adoption of organic rice growing has resulted in the reduction or cessation of chemical inputs into farmer production systems and the conservation of organic materials for soil improvement. This includes the production of organic materials through green manuring system. The network members have increase to more than 2000 households in several provinces of Northeast Thailand. Moreover, the concept of organic farming is widely integrated into provincial development plans.

The results of adopting organic farming technologies has resulted the enhancement of natural habitat conservation and a gradual improvement in basic resources. Soils are more productive with higher water use efficiencies. Health systems of the community have been improved and maintained.

Organic rice farms in Yasothon	Intensive uses of organic amendment in organic farms
Soil and water resource improvement: As production system is well improved, basic resources are in better conditions than the previous degraded system. This includes forest, wild life, soil, water and community’s way of life.