Sanitsuda Ekachai on the scapegoating of foreigners married to Thais: avoids the real problems about disappearing rice lands
By Jon Fernquest
Veteran
Bangkok Post journalist Sanitsuda Ekachai pulls no
punches
in her weekly Thursday column this week.Smallholder farming in Thailand has long been plagued with problems.
Blaming it all on foreigners simply avoids dealing with very real problems that need to be solved.
In Chiang Rai, an area that I have firsthand experience in, large swathes of farm land are bought up by wealthy Bangkokians to build resorts on, all of which is perfectly legal.
Much of the farm land in Chiang Rai is not registered in the provincial land office and officially belongs to the Forestry Department.
When farmers buy this land they go to the local headman not the provincial land office.
Sometimes local farmers sell this land to outsiders, this includes large corporations, people from Bangkok who want to build a resort, and sometimes foreign tourists married to Thais.
Sometimes you will find a patch of land smack in the middle of this Forestry Department land that is owned by a large corporation and is fully registered at the land office unlike the surrounding farm land.
Then you have wealthy locals that buy up distressed properties and sit on the land deeds sometimes for generations all the whileaccumulating capital gains on the properties.
The zoning of land for farming only might be one way around some of these problems (Read article).
As Sanitsuda points out in he following article, blaming it all on foreigners does not really solve the problem.
Article begins after the vocabulary:
scapegoating - blaming a group of
people and punishing them for things they didn't do
pulls no punches - does not try to soften what she says so that some people are not upset
plagued with problems - suffers from having many problems
firsthand experience - things that you have experienced (not told to you secondhand by others)
swathes of land - long strips of land
headman, village headman - the person who is politically in charge of the affairs of a village
smack in the middle - located exactly in the middle of an area
distressed properties - properties which the owner needs to sell now, so willing to sell for a lower price
land deeds - the document that officially shows who the owner of the land is
all the while... - during this time...
accumulating - gathering, collecting together
capital gains - profit or money made from price increase of an asset bought and held for a period of time
zoning - local laws and regulations about how a piece of land can be used
zoning the land for farming - making a law that land in an area can only be used for farming
pulls no punches - does not try to soften what she says so that some people are not upset
plagued with problems - suffers from having many problems
firsthand experience - things that you have experienced (not told to you secondhand by others)
swathes of land - long strips of land
headman, village headman - the person who is politically in charge of the affairs of a village
smack in the middle - located exactly in the middle of an area
distressed properties - properties which the owner needs to sell now, so willing to sell for a lower price
land deeds - the document that officially shows who the owner of the land is
all the while... - during this time...
accumulating - gathering, collecting together
capital gains - profit or money made from price increase of an asset bought and held for a period of time
zoning - local laws and regulations about how a piece of land can be used
zoning the land for farming - making a law that land in an area can only be used for farming
COMMENTARY
Stop hunting for 'foreign' scapegoats
Sanitsuda Ekachai13/08/2009
It is one thing to nurse concern for small-scale farmers. It is another thing, however, to make foreigners the scapegoats. For the so-called backbone of the country, the lack of farmland indeed poses a serious problem to Thai farmers, who are also struggling with indebtedness from the high cost of farm investment amid chronically low prices, while their once fertile soil is rapidly dying due to intensive chemical farming. Should we focus on the root of their problems instead of resorting to xenophobia?
The recent spate of news on proxy ownership of rice farmland by rich foreign investors has stirred much public anxiety and nationalist fervour, although much of the news has been based on the news sources' concerns, rather than on concrete evidence. According to these news reports, the foreigners - mainly those from oil-rich Arab countries - are buying up rice paddies in the countryside and hiring the locals to till the land in order to ensure sufficient rice supply for their countries, and to benefit financially from the various rice support schemes offered by the government.
While this story is going nowhere, reportedly due to the farmers' fear to talk, the latest news angle focuses on the foreign husbands of Thai women who, through their wives, are buying up farmland in scenic areas in order to build resorts.
Yes, we should be concerned about the farmers' rapid loss of land. But aren't we pointing the finger in the wrong direction?
When the government launched the Green Revolution 40 years ago with an aim to make Thailand the world's biggest rice exporter, every farmer dreamed that the high-yield rice varieties and chemical rice farming would make them prosperous for good.No one knew that they would soon suffer from frequent pestilence as a result of mono-culture farming and a losing business. How could they survive when fluctuating rice prices in the world market just could not keep up with the skyrocketing prices of farm chemicals?
While the farmers wilt, intensive chemical farming destroys soil fertility, contaminates the waterways, causes various illnesses from chemical residue in the food chain, or simply maims and kills farmers from prolonged over-exposure to hazardous chemicals.
And now when the farmers feel they know better and are trying to switch to organic farming and herbal pesticides, guess who are their main opponents? Who else but the farm chemical giants - and our very own agricultural authorities.
Remember their efforts to list such medicinal herbs that are widely used for herbal pesticides as "hazardous" and thus subject to tight control? Guess why.
Amid the losing business of rice farming, many farmers decided to sell their land to speculators under rising demand from the tourism industry and the urban middle class' need for holiday homes. For those who wanted to keep the land, many experimented with contract farming with big business, only to find themselves in the same trap of chemical farming and empty promises.
Out of familial gratitude, many daughters of poor farmers entered the sex trade to support their families. Many are severely exploited. Many have died from work-related sicknesses. But some, too, found love and security through marrying foreigners. They set up families and started doing business, as all couples do. We should be happy for them, shouldn't we? Why should we harass them with this proxy land ownership fervour?
Is it because it is much easier to hassle them than take to task the big investors, Thai and foreign, who are paying the land officials big time to get prime resort locations illegally?
Or is it because they prefer to turn a blind eye to the inequitable land ownership system, knowing that the politically powerful landlords are here to stay, regardless of their political colours?
Have some guts. Deal with destructive farming. Deal with big landlords. Deal with corrupt officials.
If the government cannot address the real cause of landlessness, leave those women who now have a life with their foreign spouses alone.
Sanitsuda Ekachai is Assistant Editor (Outlook), Bangkok Post.
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
(Source: Bangkok Post, op-ed section, Stop hunting for 'foreign' scapegoats, Sanitsuda Ekacai, 13/08/2009, site)
Vocabulary:
scapegoats - a group of people blamed and punished for things they did not do
nurse concern for - develop concern for (like "nursing" someone back to health)
scale - size (relative size)
small-scale - small size (compared to others)
small-scale farmers - farmers with small farms
backbone - the central bone that holds the body up and serves as pathway for nerves
backbone of the country - the central thing that supports the country, on which the country is built
indebtedness - owe money to people, must pay back money to people
chronically - a problem exists over a very long period of time
intensive X - doing a lot of X (in a fixed area or during a fixed time)
intensive chemical farming - using a lot of chemicals in farming
resorting to Y - choosing Y as an option
xenophobia - a strong unreasonable fear of people from other countries
spate of - a sudden increase in some kind of activity
proxy - somebody who does things for someone else, an agent
proxy ownership - somebody who owns things (like real estate or a business) for other people, to get around laws
anxiety - being worried about something
public anxiety - when large numbers of people in society are worried about something
stirred up much public anxiety - caused many people to worry about something
fervour - a very strong feeling or belief about something
nationalism - the expression of great love for your own country (sometimes with belief that your country is better than other countries)
nationalist - a person who expresses great (sometimes excessive) love for their country (see above)
nationalist fervour - very strong nationalist feelings
evidence - information that shows that something actually did happen or actually is true
concrete evidence - evidence that directly shows that something is true
circumstantial evidence - evidence that indirectly shows that something is true (add assumptions and logic first)
till the land - plow the land, break up dirt to prepare land for planting seeds
schemes - systems for achieving some goal
news angle - the way that a news item is presented (a particular way of thinking about the facts)
scenic areas - areas that are nice to travel through and look at
rapid - very fast and quickly
The Green
Revolution - applied agricultural research in the 1960s that
resulted in high yielding varieties of rice, maize, and wheat that
allowed food production to keep pace with worldwide population growth
(See Wikipedia)
prosperous - being rich and successful
make them prosperous for good - change them permanently so that they are rich and successful (like farmers in western countries)
pestilence - a widespread disease that kills (kills plants here)
mono-culture farming - growwing one kind of crop only (instead of changing regularly the crops that are grown on a piece of land)
fluctuating rice prices - rice prices that go up and down
skyrocketing prices - prices that are increasing quickly and suddenly
wilt - when the leaves of a plant fall down when they are no longer fresh and full of live
soil fertility - how good soil is for growing plants ("high fertility" means the soil is very good for growing plants)
X contaminates Y - X makes Y dangerous or harmful, X is a chemical or other harmful thing
residue - a small amount that remains after most has disappeared
food chain - who eats who in the jungle or: "the eating relationships between species within an ecosystem or a particular living place" (See Wikipedia)
chemical residue in the food chain - poisons and dangerous checmicals remain in crops and animals even until they are made into food that people eat
maims - injuring very badly
prolonged - for a long period of time
exposure to Y - have contact with substance Y
hazardous - can cause harm, dangerous
prolonged over-exposure to hazardous chemicals -
farm chemical giants - the large companies that produce chemicals used by farmers (pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizer)
agricultural authorities - government officials that deal with farming and agricultural issues
pesticides - substances or chemicals that kill insects that damage crops
contract farming - when a small farmer produces crops for a large company according to a contract (See Wikipedia)
empty promises - promises that are made but not kept (say you are going to do something but don't do it)
gratitude - wishing to show appreciation and thanks for things that others have done for you
out of Y, X done out of Y - X was done for reason Y
out of familial gratitude - done to show your family thanks and appreciation of them
exploited - used for personal gain
security - the activity of making safe or protecting from harm
harass - cause trouble and problems for a person, annoy
take to task - criticize, find fault with
land officials - workers in the government land department (that registers and records ownership of land)
turn a blind eye to - don't do anything to solve a problem (pretend they don't see or know about a problem)
inequitable - not fair (some people get better treatment than other people get)
landlords - the owners of land or real estate (here farmland)
their political colours? - which political party or side they are a member of
have some guts - have courage, don't be a coward, don't be scared
landlessness - the condition of a farmer not having land to grow crops on to support their family
