Adoption of organic rice farming in northeastern Thailand: A case study on farmers' opinions, attitudes, and practices

摘要

Organic farming has recently gained increasing recognition as an effective and holistic approach compatible with the goals of agricultural practices that are socially, environmentally and economically sustainable. A point of fact is that organic farming is centered on minimizing the use of costly external inputs such as synthetic fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides in order to reduce farming cost on one hand, and increase income and productivity of rice farmers on the other hand. In Thailand, organic fanning methods have been adopted slowly in rural communities especially among those facing socio-economic and agronomic constraints. Economic crisis and low farm productivity and profitability caused by using costly chemicals have caused farmers to suffer socio-economic disadvantages. However, the promotion and implementation of organic farming methods largely through conventional farm extension service could not serve all farmers because of numerous constraints of farm conditions, farmer socio-economic backgrounds, farm soil conditions, agricultural credit facilities and so on.