More surprising was him bringing up the subject of ethnicity, which has been a bit of an elephant in the room everyone has tried to ignore,
That’s a very nice way of putting it. Look, I don’t like Thaksin. But Young’s analysis is blatantly racist and is deeply offensive to anyone of Chinese extraction. That doesn’t make his characterization of “Thai Thais” any better – portraying them has nice, sweet, innocent passive types plays directly off of Western stereotypes of Asians that the late Edward Said so passionately denounced.
Young’s speech should be offensive to all Thais, no matter their ethnic extraction.
Andrew, thanks. Much more interesting chart. The Thailand performance is pitiful. What is striking is the complete stagnation over the 20 years 1971-1991 while both Laos and Indonesia increased yields by 50 percent. Since 1991, Thailand at least shows some growth.
I wonder why the IRRI and OAE figures are different? Where else would IRRI get data from? I confess I was given the OAE figures and I haven’t checked them, but the donor was reliable.
Remember this time last year, during the rice price spike, Dhanin CP was saying: let us manage the irrigated paddy area under contract farming, and we’ll double yields. Looks feasible. The question is why is that not attainable under owner cultivation?
How does Ban Thiam fit with this picture. Above or below the national average yield? Same trajectory?
Are there no data for Vietnam? Surely it should be on the chart.
Singapore is a fraud. It’s a tyrannical rule under tyrant. The island of surveillance.
I was one of those fooled. Searched and research into David Widjaja case and you will find out how dangerous it is to live in the city. An innocent foreign student a non activist could be killed and everything and everyone in Singapore would conspire against his case.
——————————————————————————-
Read this too, one of very few who spoke up and look what she has to endure for speaking up
Prof Lee Wei Ling’s article on ‘Righting a wrong comes from the heart’ (The Sunday Times 18th Jan 2009) seems to talk about me. haha….
If I know there is something wrong, I will try to set it right whether or not it is my business to do so. At my age, I have not lost the fire in my belly. But such a busybody trait has got me into a lot of trouble because I’m not Prof Lee Wei Ling, who is the daughter of MM Lee Kuan Yew and sister of PM Lee Hsien Loong.
I was threatened to shut up. My son’s life will be in danger if I continue to set things right. My son has a hard time in schools.
I have many personal experiences with MOE, which is very guilty of not setting things right. They allow teachers and principals to abuse students. Their educators cheat, lie but such cases were covered up. MOE condone wrong doings of their staff. One of their PR officers even threatened an editor against pursuing a case I was complaining.
I have an extremely hard time with the Immigration and Checkpoint Authority (ICA) recently. I find the officers very KL, making things more difficult for me after I complained to Minister Wong Kan Seng. Many people said I deserve it. For setting things right?
Even in a government hospital, my son and I were not spared. I wrote to Minister of Health Khaw Boon Wan but sigh…… Luckily, I would be meeting Prof Lee Wei Ling. She has agreed to see my son.
It’s our duty to right a wrong when we see one……. and you don’t have to be MM Lee’s daughter to do that.
—————————————————–
Another one who spoke up. A Singapore police officer making a death threat to its citizen:
Gary: He said to me at the lift lobby 90% of the exact words – ”Mr Tan,if you walk out of here tomorrow,you might get killed.You might meet with a mysterious accident,you might disappear and nobody will know what happened to you! Mr Tan, some things and people in this country you cannot offend! Some people are above all things! You better make sure you know this! Mr Tan,we can arrange for things to happen to you.You understand or not!”
The guy was threatened to be locked in mental institution and now undergoing trial on shoptheft probably with false witnesses too.
This is an amazing piece of propaganda. I am sure the man believes what he is saying and some of it is quite correct. Thaksin belongs to the Chinese diaspora in Thailand. But it is a very simplistic view of the situation. Hitler also did some very nice things for the people, like autobahns, etc. So when you bring electricity and water the people need to be thankful and revere you? Actually this is quite a “Confucian” view of things especially in respect to the power relation. Am I misunderstanding? Was this not what he accused the previous government of doing. Incomprehensible.
Perhaps the answer is hidden in factor productivity. There was some research on this from Peter Warr http://www.equitablepolicy.org/wpaper/200606.pdf where he concluded:-
“The results of the analysis of this paper indicate that agriculture’s contribution to economic growth in both Thailand and Indonesia included impressive rates of TFP growth. But its main contribution occurred through releasing resources which could be used more productively elsewhere, while still maintaining output, rather than through expansion of agricultural output. It is seriously wrong to characterize agriculture in these countries as ‘stagnant’, based merely on the fact that output growth is slower in agriculture than in other sectors. If agriculture had really been ‘stagnant’ economic growth would have been substantially lower because it would not have been possible to raise productivity significantly within agriculture or to release resources massively while still maintaining moderate growth of output.”
Ha-ha, there’s nobody quite as royalist as an American royalist.
More surprising was him bringing up the subject of ethnicity, which has been a bit of an elephant in the room everyone has tried to ignore, mainly as it crosses through the present political spectrum, especially the leaderships of all sides.
Is there a lower amount of land being used for rice as opposed to other crops? Is rice a less important cash crop than before? Also are more harvests being made in a single year than previously? And would any of these make a difference to the figures?
Driving around some backwaters of Chaiyuphun province a few weeks ago I was surprised by farmers talking about second and third rice crops. I can’t remember this from previous visits to the same area over the last 25 years, but I might be wrong.
Also something must being going right by the obvious increase in standard of living. At a village market I was surprised by the number of new looking pickups, cars and bikes. 20 years ago owning a vehicle was not at all common there.
Last question. Has the use of mechanical harvesters changed the yield? I have been told that hand harvesting is far less wasteful although obviously more expensive in labour. Again 20 years I don’t think I had ever seen a mechanical rice harvester in the whole of Thailand.
Based on the bio provided elsewhere in New Mandala by Ralph (link) Stephen Young is clearly an conservative academic from the US who has a well-formulated philosophy developed over many years about the nature of Asian politics. Maybe he is ex-CIA too.
It is a sad fact that you have to find out his bio and background in the comments to New Mandala. This certainly has the appearance of hiding something.
It is also a sad fact that most Farang who have written on or engaged with Thailand intellectually have done so through their affiliation with some highly partisan organisation, whether it be mostly NGOs nowadays or the CIA and US military presence in Southeast Asia during Vietnam war. The only scholar that seems able to be objective is the Pasuk & Baker transnational team/intellectual entity.
Yippeeee!! It gives me immense pleasure to see KFC make inroads into every corner of the world.
KFC spreads the message of love & peace around to everyone (regardless of their imperialist or communist ideologies). Killing of animals and birds and then deep frying the dead body for food makes for a yummy & a peaceful world…!!!
And we wonder, research & have intellectually stimulating discussions about why are there is mindless violence & conflict in this world and what can be done about the same.
Are there data for India or Vietnam or the Phillipines? Just curious if these differences are a matter of tropic vs. temperate zone, or it’s something unique about Thailand.
Very interesting Andrew, and I support the idea behind your analysis completely. But can you go a bit deeper?
The big change in your rice chart is China. That change is associated with a political transformation of massive proportions. So let’s put China aside.
In your chart, the ratio between the yield in Thailand and the yield in Korea/Japan has been quite stable. This gap between Thailand and Korea/Japan is a function of very different climatic, social, and technological conditions.
So what happens if you put Malaysia, Philippines, and Indonesia on the chart – countries with climatic, social, and technological conditions relatively similar to Thailand?
On the basis of OAE figures, Thai average rice yields have increased over the last decade from 2,400 to 3,200 kg/ha. I think that’s the fastest improvement in yields ever in Thailand. How it happened I can’t imagine. Maybe I’m reading the data wrong. But maybe your chart is obscuring the really important change by focusing on some less interesting comparisons.
Trying for advice about which is the best teeth whitening products to use?
It can be hard to come across the right information as far as I can see. this place tells you one thing and a different place tells you something completely the opposite!
Well, I thought the smartest thing to do is get real feedback from you folks as you could have personal knowledge about these things.
Thanks to jonfernquest for the link. At that location there are also versions of various constitutions that might prove useful to NM readers also.
My feeling is that Young was CIA and the links of US intelligence with the palace are hard to research because released CIA documents seem to delete a lot about the king and palace. But I haven’t done a thorough study of these as they become available. Anyone have any information?
Once a member of the top 30, Thailand also saw its ranking drop last year to 34th place.The country’s competitiveness suffers from protracted instability. Unsurprisingly, the quality of public institutions continues to deteriorate. Ranked 63rd in this category, Thailand has dropped 20 places over the past three years. Insufficient protection of property rights (75th) and security (85th) are of particular concern to the business community, the report said.
Aside from concerns over public health, Thailand’s technological readiness (63rd) is also lagging. Although mobile-telephone penetration is among the densest in the world, at 124 mobile subscriptions per 100 population, the use of the Internet (21 users per 100) and computers (6 per 100) remains scarce.Thailand’s government has banned over 5000 websites now. Limiting any access to the real world and what is going on. As Thailand shelters from the realities of the world it keeps droping down the list, with no way out!
aiontay: “I’m not sure exactly how Singapore splitting off from Malaysia really has anything to do with the Chinese government’s problems with Burma.”
In Malaysia, the Chinese are discriminated and feared, just as they are in Burma. Singapore is a country of Chinese run by Chinese.
There are two major things that the Burmese junta desperate want to solve. The influx of Chinese settling in Burma worries the Burmese, this is one reason Chinese traders and new settlers are being targeted, quite probably and perhaps covertly encouraged by the Burmese junta. The second reason is that they want to be rid of the peace treaty groups and their autonomy of the border region. The Chinese now have their billion dollar gas pipe-line at stake. Do they side with the Burmese junta and wipe the Kokangs and Wa off to protect their gas pipeline or do they remain faithful to the long-term allies, the remnants of the Communist party?
History repeats, or perhaps the military junta is working on how to repeat their previous success along their border with Thailand. First, it closes off the Thai border trade as well as fishing rights until Bangkok began to squeal in pain. Then it demanded Thai cooperate with rounding up and handing over Burmese dissidents that were active on Thai soil. Then Thailand ceased being the sanctuary and arms conduit for the Karen National Union (KNU) which helped to escalate the fall and end of one of the largest armed groups which had been warring with the Burmese for decades.
If the Chinese cooperate with the Burmese junta, then the end is nigh for the various alphabetical groups on the Sino-burma border.
If the Chinese cooperate, Burma will be rid of the ‘alphabets’ but will have to put up with the influx of Chinese taking over Burma. China may choose to be loyal to their long-term allies, not because of scruples, rather as a thorn to twist into the Burmese junta on a rainy day.
“Rural people in their communities have always had their patrons. They can always have some influence in this group and that group. I have my view, my patron. I look up to you, you take care of me. You are at the provincial level and you reach the Bangkok level, so I can get it to the Bangkok level only through you. This has been true for a long time.”
A clearer, more outright expression of the patriarchal and static royalist view on Thailand’s rural constituency is hard to come by. For that I thank professor Young . Many thanks for the link
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Lost for words
More surprising was him bringing up the subject of ethnicity, which has been a bit of an elephant in the room everyone has tried to ignore,
That’s a very nice way of putting it. Look, I don’t like Thaksin. But Young’s analysis is blatantly racist and is deeply offensive to anyone of Chinese extraction. That doesn’t make his characterization of “Thai Thais” any better – portraying them has nice, sweet, innocent passive types plays directly off of Western stereotypes of Asians that the late Edward Said so passionately denounced.
Young’s speech should be offensive to all Thais, no matter their ethnic extraction.
More on Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Andrew, thanks. Much more interesting chart. The Thailand performance is pitiful. What is striking is the complete stagnation over the 20 years 1971-1991 while both Laos and Indonesia increased yields by 50 percent. Since 1991, Thailand at least shows some growth.
I wonder why the IRRI and OAE figures are different? Where else would IRRI get data from? I confess I was given the OAE figures and I haven’t checked them, but the donor was reliable.
Remember this time last year, during the rice price spike, Dhanin CP was saying: let us manage the irrigated paddy area under contract farming, and we’ll double yields. Looks feasible. The question is why is that not attainable under owner cultivation?
How does Ban Thiam fit with this picture. Above or below the national average yield? Same trajectory?
Are there no data for Vietnam? Surely it should be on the chart.
“Lee Kuan Yew – ANU is not for you!”
Singapore is a fraud. It’s a tyrannical rule under tyrant. The island of surveillance.
I was one of those fooled. Searched and research into David Widjaja case and you will find out how dangerous it is to live in the city. An innocent foreign student a non activist could be killed and everything and everyone in Singapore would conspire against his case.
——————————————————————————-
Read this too, one of very few who spoke up and look what she has to endure for speaking up
http://topmleehsienloong.blogspot.com/2009/01/righting-wrong.html.
Copied content below for all to read
Righting a Wrong
Prof Lee Wei Ling’s article on ‘Righting a wrong comes from the heart’ (The Sunday Times 18th Jan 2009) seems to talk about me. haha….
If I know there is something wrong, I will try to set it right whether or not it is my business to do so. At my age, I have not lost the fire in my belly. But such a busybody trait has got me into a lot of trouble because I’m not Prof Lee Wei Ling, who is the daughter of MM Lee Kuan Yew and sister of PM Lee Hsien Loong.
I was threatened to shut up. My son’s life will be in danger if I continue to set things right. My son has a hard time in schools.
I have many personal experiences with MOE, which is very guilty of not setting things right. They allow teachers and principals to abuse students. Their educators cheat, lie but such cases were covered up. MOE condone wrong doings of their staff. One of their PR officers even threatened an editor against pursuing a case I was complaining.
I have an extremely hard time with the Immigration and Checkpoint Authority (ICA) recently. I find the officers very KL, making things more difficult for me after I complained to Minister Wong Kan Seng. Many people said I deserve it. For setting things right?
Even in a government hospital, my son and I were not spared. I wrote to Minister of Health Khaw Boon Wan but sigh…… Luckily, I would be meeting Prof Lee Wei Ling. She has agreed to see my son.
It’s our duty to right a wrong when we see one……. and you don’t have to be MM Lee’s daughter to do that.
—————————————————–
Another one who spoke up. A Singapore police officer making a death threat to its citizen:
Gary: He said to me at the lift lobby 90% of the exact words – ”Mr Tan,if you walk out of here tomorrow,you might get killed.You might meet with a mysterious accident,you might disappear and nobody will know what happened to you! Mr Tan, some things and people in this country you cannot offend! Some people are above all things! You better make sure you know this! Mr Tan,we can arrange for things to happen to you.You understand or not!”
The guy was threatened to be locked in mental institution and now undergoing trial on shoptheft probably with false witnesses too.
Lost for words
This is an amazing piece of propaganda. I am sure the man believes what he is saying and some of it is quite correct. Thaksin belongs to the Chinese diaspora in Thailand. But it is a very simplistic view of the situation. Hitler also did some very nice things for the people, like autobahns, etc. So when you bring electricity and water the people need to be thankful and revere you? Actually this is quite a “Confucian” view of things especially in respect to the power relation. Am I misunderstanding? Was this not what he accused the previous government of doing. Incomprehensible.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Perhaps the answer is hidden in factor productivity. There was some research on this from Peter Warr http://www.equitablepolicy.org/wpaper/200606.pdf where he concluded:-
“The results of the analysis of this paper indicate that agriculture’s contribution to economic growth in both Thailand and Indonesia included impressive rates of TFP growth. But its main contribution occurred through releasing resources which could be used more productively elsewhere, while still maintaining output, rather than through expansion of agricultural output. It is seriously wrong to characterize agriculture in these countries as ‘stagnant’, based merely on the fact that output growth is slower in agriculture than in other sectors. If agriculture had really been ‘stagnant’ economic growth would have been substantially lower because it would not have been possible to raise productivity significantly within agriculture or to release resources massively while still maintaining moderate growth of output.”
Lost for words
Ha-ha, there’s nobody quite as royalist as an American royalist.
More surprising was him bringing up the subject of ethnicity, which has been a bit of an elephant in the room everyone has tried to ignore, mainly as it crosses through the present political spectrum, especially the leaderships of all sides.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Is there a lower amount of land being used for rice as opposed to other crops? Is rice a less important cash crop than before? Also are more harvests being made in a single year than previously? And would any of these make a difference to the figures?
Driving around some backwaters of Chaiyuphun province a few weeks ago I was surprised by farmers talking about second and third rice crops. I can’t remember this from previous visits to the same area over the last 25 years, but I might be wrong.
Also something must being going right by the obvious increase in standard of living. At a village market I was surprised by the number of new looking pickups, cars and bikes. 20 years ago owning a vehicle was not at all common there.
Last question. Has the use of mechanical harvesters changed the yield? I have been told that hand harvesting is far less wasteful although obviously more expensive in labour. Again 20 years I don’t think I had ever seen a mechanical rice harvester in the whole of Thailand.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
[…] XHTML ← Thailand’s low agricultural productivity […]
Lost for words
Based on the bio provided elsewhere in New Mandala by Ralph (link) Stephen Young is clearly an conservative academic from the US who has a well-formulated philosophy developed over many years about the nature of Asian politics. Maybe he is ex-CIA too.
It is a sad fact that you have to find out his bio and background in the comments to New Mandala. This certainly has the appearance of hiding something.
It is also a sad fact that most Farang who have written on or engaged with Thailand intellectually have done so through their affiliation with some highly partisan organisation, whether it be mostly NGOs nowadays or the CIA and US military presence in Southeast Asia during Vietnam war. The only scholar that seems able to be objective is the Pasuk & Baker transnational team/intellectual entity.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Mr. Reader: of course they do. Keep ’em down on the farm and keep ’em quiet. If that doesn’t work, transfer more troops up there.
A last frontier for KFC
Yippeeee!! It gives me immense pleasure to see KFC make inroads into every corner of the world.
KFC spreads the message of love & peace around to everyone (regardless of their imperialist or communist ideologies). Killing of animals and birds and then deep frying the dead body for food makes for a yummy & a peaceful world…!!!
And we wonder, research & have intellectually stimulating discussions about why are there is mindless violence & conflict in this world and what can be done about the same.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Google:
NECTEC + buffaloes
You will get interesting results. The Institution supports work against higher productivity in farm lands.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Are there data for India or Vietnam or the Phillipines? Just curious if these differences are a matter of tropic vs. temperate zone, or it’s something unique about Thailand.
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Very interesting Andrew, and I support the idea behind your analysis completely. But can you go a bit deeper?
The big change in your rice chart is China. That change is associated with a political transformation of massive proportions. So let’s put China aside.
In your chart, the ratio between the yield in Thailand and the yield in Korea/Japan has been quite stable. This gap between Thailand and Korea/Japan is a function of very different climatic, social, and technological conditions.
So what happens if you put Malaysia, Philippines, and Indonesia on the chart – countries with climatic, social, and technological conditions relatively similar to Thailand?
On the basis of OAE figures, Thai average rice yields have increased over the last decade from 2,400 to 3,200 kg/ha. I think that’s the fastest improvement in yields ever in Thailand. How it happened I can’t imagine. Maybe I’m reading the data wrong. But maybe your chart is obscuring the really important change by focusing on some less interesting comparisons.
Longest New Mandala threads
Hey there Dudes,
Trying for advice about which is the best teeth whitening products to use?
It can be hard to come across the right information as far as I can see. this place tells you one thing and a different place tells you something completely the opposite!
Well, I thought the smartest thing to do is get real feedback from you folks as you could have personal knowledge about these things.
Any feedback is greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance folks.
Lost for words
Thanks to jonfernquest for the link. At that location there are also versions of various constitutions that might prove useful to NM readers also.
My feeling is that Young was CIA and the links of US intelligence with the palace are hard to research because released CIA documents seem to delete a lot about the king and palace. But I haven’t done a thorough study of these as they become available. Anyone have any information?
Thailand’s low agricultural productivity
Once a member of the top 30, Thailand also saw its ranking drop last year to 34th place.The country’s competitiveness suffers from protracted instability. Unsurprisingly, the quality of public institutions continues to deteriorate. Ranked 63rd in this category, Thailand has dropped 20 places over the past three years. Insufficient protection of property rights (75th) and security (85th) are of particular concern to the business community, the report said.
Aside from concerns over public health, Thailand’s technological readiness (63rd) is also lagging. Although mobile-telephone penetration is among the densest in the world, at 124 mobile subscriptions per 100 population, the use of the Internet (21 users per 100) and computers (6 per 100) remains scarce.Thailand’s government has banned over 5000 websites now. Limiting any access to the real world and what is going on. As Thailand shelters from the realities of the world it keeps droping down the list, with no way out!
A Sino-Burmese border dance
aiontay: “I’m not sure exactly how Singapore splitting off from Malaysia really has anything to do with the Chinese government’s problems with Burma.”
In Malaysia, the Chinese are discriminated and feared, just as they are in Burma. Singapore is a country of Chinese run by Chinese.
There are two major things that the Burmese junta desperate want to solve. The influx of Chinese settling in Burma worries the Burmese, this is one reason Chinese traders and new settlers are being targeted, quite probably and perhaps covertly encouraged by the Burmese junta. The second reason is that they want to be rid of the peace treaty groups and their autonomy of the border region. The Chinese now have their billion dollar gas pipe-line at stake. Do they side with the Burmese junta and wipe the Kokangs and Wa off to protect their gas pipeline or do they remain faithful to the long-term allies, the remnants of the Communist party?
History repeats, or perhaps the military junta is working on how to repeat their previous success along their border with Thailand. First, it closes off the Thai border trade as well as fishing rights until Bangkok began to squeal in pain. Then it demanded Thai cooperate with rounding up and handing over Burmese dissidents that were active on Thai soil. Then Thailand ceased being the sanctuary and arms conduit for the Karen National Union (KNU) which helped to escalate the fall and end of one of the largest armed groups which had been warring with the Burmese for decades.
If the Chinese cooperate with the Burmese junta, then the end is nigh for the various alphabetical groups on the Sino-burma border.
If the Chinese cooperate, Burma will be rid of the ‘alphabets’ but will have to put up with the influx of Chinese taking over Burma. China may choose to be loyal to their long-term allies, not because of scruples, rather as a thorn to twist into the Burmese junta on a rainy day.
Lost for words
“Rural people in their communities have always had their patrons. They can always have some influence in this group and that group. I have my view, my patron. I look up to you, you take care of me. You are at the provincial level and you reach the Bangkok level, so I can get it to the Bangkok level only through you. This has been true for a long time.”
A clearer, more outright expression of the patriarchal and static royalist view on Thailand’s rural constituency is hard to come by. For that I thank professor Young . Many thanks for the link
Lost for words
is he still in Ban Chiang era??