Agricultural and Resource Economics

Climate change is a modern day concern of serious proportions. Reducing vulnerability to climate change impacts may be viewed either in terms of risk reduction or improvement in adaptive capacity, or both. At the community and household levels, lessening the risk of climate change might be impossible in some instances. Therefore, reducing vulnerability can be done only by enhancing the adaptive capacity of the affected households and communities. In Thailand, flooding is a major climate change impact. This study, carried out in Thailand, set out to determine the indicators of adaptive capacity and measure the adaptation gaps between past adaptation measures and alternative adaptation possibilities. Adaptation possibilities were not restricted to new methods of adaptation, but included improvements to previous adaptation actions in terms of level and timing. Chiang Mai Province was chosen as the study area since it had a long history of flooding. Studying how the people adapted to th...

Recent research on payments for environmental services (PES) has observed that high transaction costs (TCs) are incurred through the implementation of PES schemes and farmer participation. TCs incurred by households are considered to be an obstacle to the participation in and efficiency of PES policies. This study aims to understand transactions related to previous forest plantation programmes and to estimate the actual TCs incurred by farmers who participated in these programmes in a mountainous area of northwestern Vietnam. In addition, this study examines determinants of households’ TCs to test the hypothesis of whether the amount of TCs varies according to household characteristics. Results show that average TCs are not likely to be a constraint for participation since they are about 200,000 VND (USD 10) per household per contract, which is equivalent to one person’s average earnings for about two days of labour. However, TCs amount to more than one-third of the programmes’ bene...

1. To identify existing fisheries and coastal community-based management and co-management in Thailand. 2. To review the practice of fisheries and coastal community-based management, as well as co-management in Thailand. 3. To identify the criteria of success for fisheries and coastal community-based and co-management in Thailand.

Chemical composition, texture, color and acceptability of crispy snack produced from different rations of three mushrooms (shiitake mushroom; LM, straw mushroom; VM and Indian oyster mushroom; PM) were studied. Different six ratios of LM: VM: PM as 100:0:0, 50:45:5, 50:35:15, 50:25:25, 50:15:35 and 50:5:45 (w: w: w) were used for mushroom sheet production. All mushroom sheet samples contained 20.7-23.6% protein, 0.21-0.28% fat, 6.6-8.4% ash and 9.9-11.4% crude fiber. For textural properties, mushroom sheet produced from 100% LM showed the lowest hardness, compared with other samples (p<0.05). Due to the moisture content was 6.2-6.9%, no difference in number of force peak of all samples was observed (p>0.05). As the VM and PM ratios increased, L*, a* and b* increased (p<0.05). Mushroom sheet produced from LM: VM: PM at ratio of 50:25:25 showed a greater acceptability than other samples (p<0.05). Therefore, the hardness, color, and acceptability of mushroom sheet could be influenced by the different ratio of LM: VM: PM. Therefore, mushroom sheet produced from three mushroom species could be a crispy and healthy snack food.

Market channel selection by small-scale rice farmer in Thailand can be different from other agricultural products.  One of the reasons is Thai government used to subsidise rice farmers under Rice-Pledging Scheme (RPS).  The scheme ended in February 2014, and rice farmers are faced with a more competitive market environment and need to take more proactive decision making in their choice of market. 

This research proposal reviews studies on the market channel selection ofsmall-scale farmers in general and in Thailand in particular. It then identifies a major research gap in understanding of whether Thai small-scale rice farmers have changed their marketing channels after that end of RPS and what the key influential factors are.Proposed research methodology will be presented.

The expected potential contribution of this research is to add to the current understanding of factors influencing choice of market channels by small-scale rice farmersin Thailand.

This study examines the factors that affect marketing channel selections of rice farmers in Thailand, which are believed to be distinctive compared with those of other agricultural products. One of the possible reasons for the differences is the Thai government
has formally, over many years, subsidised rice farmers under the rice pledging scheme (RPS). Since the scheme ended in 2014, rice farmers have been facing a more competitive market environment and need to be more proactive in their choice of marketing and this research aims to generate greater understanding of the drivers of choice in order this issue may be addressed. This study identified factors affecting the marketing channel choices drawing on the framework of the Theory of Planned Behaviour and literature review. A multimethod approach was adopted involving preliminary in-depth interviews with 33 participants
and a face-to-face questionnaire survey with 661 rice farmers in 3 main rice production regions by using purposive and convenience sampling techniques.
The results showed that Thai rice farmers mainly rely on three main channels: miller, local collector, and agricultural cooperative to sell their rice. Three other channels also used by farmers were: central paddy market, individual direct selling and group direct selling. Paired samples t-test was used to compare the channels used before and after the RPS
ended from which it was determined that there were statistical differences between regions, education levels, sources of information, type of rice growing, production partly for own consumption or not, use of hired vehicles or not and distance to market in the different channels on past behaviour and intention.
Partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) was used to test the hypothetical relationships based on the results from principal components analysis and reliability of scale. The results identified that intention had been directly affected by past behaviour, attitude, subjective norm, farmers’ power, consideration of transaction specific
cost and channel accessibility of which indirectly influenced on intention through past behaviour. Therefore, the significance of path relationships in different channel choices had been addressed by using multi-group analysis. The findings could have potential implications for many stakeholders, e.g. policy makers, farmers and rice buyers, illustrating
the importance of these factors in understanding rice farmers in making channel choice decisions.
Key words: marketing channel, rice, rice pledging scheme, Theory of Planned Behaviour,
multi-method, partial least squares structural equation modelling, Thailand

Government policies often attempt to create simultaneous impact on economic efficiency and equity. The Ethiopian government optimistically has targeted to simultaneously achieve at improvement in agricultural efficiency (growth) and equitable distribution of the benefits by all farmers in the whole part of the country. However, many scholars most often argue that growth and equity are inversely related in most development processes. Thus, the main objective of the paper was to evaluate the interhousehold and interregional technology adoption pattern (implies both growth and equity). The conceptual relationship of growth and equity, and experiences in adoption studies were first assessed. Then three ecological potentials with 150 sample size each (a total of 450) were studied using Probit Model. The study result has shown that only 35.5% of the sample adopted. The beneficiaries of the extension were relatively the resource rich farmers of which the largest proportion were concentrated in the high potentials areas. The high potential areas benefited remarkably higher net returns to land and management from the use of same technology than the other areas. Thus, alike the previous extension approaches used in the country and as supported by lists of literature, the new extension system could not be also free from such bias at least in the short-run. Conclusively, differential adoption of technology within a certain period of time can be regarded as a natural phenomenon. Hence, efforts to enable both the poor and the rich to equally adopt agricultural technology would rather imply substituting equity for growth at a very low level of the economy status that has immeasurable social cost. For countries like Ethiopia, which is at a very low level of economic status, focusing on growth through increasing the farm productivity of the potential adopters in the short-run, and designing special programs for the poor to follow their footsteps is suggestible. Otherwise, the country may remain behind while pulling both the poor and the rich together.

The aim of this work was to explore the effect of zeolite ZSM-5 (ZSM5) incorporation sequence on the phase morphology, microstructure, and performance of polyethylene/thermoplastic starch (PE/TPS) films. Two processing sequences were used for preparing PE/TPS/ZSM5 composites at a weight ratio of PE to TPS of 70:30 and ZSM5 concentrations of 1-5 wt%: (i) melt compounding of PE with ZSM5 prior to melt blending with TPS (SI); and (ii) TPS was compounded with ZSM5 prior to blending with PE (SII). Distributive mixing and mechanical properties of PE/TPS blend were greatly enhanced when ZSM5 was incorporated via SII. These were caused by both the higher affinity between PE and ZSM5, compared to that of TPS and ZSM5, and the reduction of TPS viscosity after compounding with ZSM5, leading to migration of ZSM5 from TPS dispersed phase toward PE matrix and increase in breakup of TPS droplets during SII sequence.

Polymer composites consisting of linear low-density (LLDPE), thermoplastic starch (TPS), and zeolite 5A (Z), with a constant PE to TPS weight ratio of 70 : 30 and zeolite 5A contents of 1-5 wt % were prepared in the forms of pellets and films by using a co-rotating intermeshing twin-screw extruder and a blown film extrusion line, respectively. The objective of this work was to investigate the effect of zeolite 5A on compatibility between PE and TPS, as well as morphological, thermal, and tensile properties of PE/TPS/Z composites. The presence of zeolite 5A increased the miscibility and tensile properties of the PE/TPS blend. Tensile properties of the blend considerably improved after compounding with zeo-lite 5A, as the tensile strength, modulus, and elongation at break increased significantly (P 0.05

The objective of this work was to investigate blend ratio and storage time effects on the morphological, mechanical, and thermal properties of thermoplastic starch/ poly(butylene adipate-co-terephthalate) (TPS/PBAT) films. TPS was prepared from plasticized cassava starch using a twin-screw extruder. TPS was subsequently melt-blended with PBAT with varied weight ratios (i.e., 20/80, 40/ 60 and 60/40) and blown to form TPS/PBAT films. It was found that increasing the TPS/PBAT ratio to 40/60 led to improved distributions of polymeric components and increased PBAT crystallization temperatures while reducing TPS melting transitions and tensile properties of TPS/PBAT films. After three months of storage at 30 C, the tensile strength and secant modulus at 2% strain of TPS/PBAT films increased due to recrystallization of both TPS and PBAT. Blend ratios were the primary determinant for changes in TPS/PBAT film elongation at break with this storage time.