Development of a Community Rice Center Network in the Mool River Basin

Abstract

       This was a participatory action research with the objectives of 1. studying the situation of community rice centers in the Mool River Basin; 2. developing a network of community rice centers in the Mool River Basin; and 3. studying factors that affected the development of that network. The sample population was the 28 community rice centers in the 9 provinces of the study area, and from each rice center, representatives of leaders and members were selected through purposive sampling. The tools used to collect data were structured interview forms, topics at participatory action seminars and evaluation forms to measure indicators of the strength of the community rice centers. Descriptive statistics (percentage, mean and standard deviation) were used to analyze quantitative data and the methods of comparison, causality analysis, interpretation and categorization were used to analyze qualitative data.    

The results showed that:

      1. The community rice centers studied had been in operation for a mean of 8 years. They received assistance in the form of factors of production from the Department of Agricultural Extension, the Rice Department and their local Tambol Administrative Organizations. Geographically, some were located in valleys and some on plateaus. For rice seed production, they planted rice and weeded out rogues. Most of the centers produced the Kao Dok Mali 105 variety. They mostly distributed the seed to farmers in the community and nearby areas. As for management, the rice centers were run by committees composed of a chairman, vice chairman, members, treasurer and secretary. They had demonstration fields following the farmer school model. They had rules for managing the centers’ funds and they paid dividends to members. As for the problems faced by the community rice centers, the most severe problems were management problems involving leadership, planning, group activities, evaluation, rules, and meetings. Less severe problems were problems with knowledge, seed production, marketing, distribution and fund management.     

         2. The development of a network of community rice centers in the Mool River Basin consisted of 1) Setting the steps- 6 steps were decided on: goal setting, setting indicators to measure the strength of the network, setting development strategies and plans, exchange of knowledge, following up on progress with the network development, and evaluation. 2) Analysis of the results of the process of developing the network of community rice centers- the results of each step were as follows: Goals of the network—4 goals were identified: to make the management of rice centers more efficient, to develop activities that would connect the rice centers in the network, to develop connections between the network and outside organizations, and to develop more support from government agencies. Indicators of the strength of the network—4 indicators were identified: (1) the network management process; (2) network activities; (3) status of the network’s operations/coordination with other groups and organizations; and (4) government support. Strategies and plans to develop the network—strategies consisted of strategies to expand the network, marketing strategies and knowledge exchange strategies. The plans were the individual plans of each community rice center in the network, most of which involved training, study tours, knowledge exchange, and provincial-level and whole network-level meetings to set plans for the network. Knowledge exchange—2 study trips were organized to visit the Yasothon Province Sufficiency Agriculture Learning Center and the Surin Community Rice Center. Follow-up—one follow-up check was made after the plan had been set. Evaluation—The community rice centers had taken action on almost all the indicators, but there were some marketing, rice exchange and coordination activities that nearly half of the member rice centers had not yet taken action on, namely: using the network logo, using the same standard of packaging, buying rice seed from within the network for re-sale, traceability checks, exchange of land race rice breeds, conservation of local land races and germplasm collection by the network, and coordination with provincial commerce offices, stores and rice mills. 3) Ways to strengthen the network- 4  areas were identified: (1) ways to develop the network; (2) ways to build up a market and seed distribution network; (3) setting of topics for knowledge exchange to increase the community rice centers’ capabilities; and (4) ways of knowledge exchange to develop the network.

          3. There were internal and external factors that affected development of the network of community rice centers. Internal factors consisted of the organization’s vision and leadership, strategic planning of the production process and quality control, acquisition of funding, management of the rules of community rice centers and personnel development at the rice centers. External factors consisted of target farmers’ acceptance of the quality of the rice seed, technological level of the equipment and machinery used to produce the rice seed, price of the rice seed, market competition, government policies and support, free trade in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), competing rice seed-producing countries, and linkage of the network of community rice centers with related organizations.