[hepr-vn] WB: Rice prices - Viewed from Vietnamese fields

[Vern Weitzel]

http://eapblog.worldbank.org/content/rice-prices-viewed-from-vietnamese-fields?cid=EXTEAPBlogEmail

Rice prices - Viewed from Vietnamese fields
Submitted by Flore de Préneuf on Wed, 04/09/2008 - 22:11.

I just returned from the Mekong Delta – Vietnam’s “rice basket” – to look at the 
results of development projects partly financed by the World Bank. With rice 
prices going through the roof, I expected to see farmers enjoying a financial 
boom. But, reality was more nuanced and underscored how difficult it is to grow 
more rice at the drop of a bamboo hat.

One of the projects I looked at improved water management in the delta by 
upgrading canals and building more gates (known as sluice gates). The idea is to 
prevent water from the sea from intruding and ruining crops in the dry season; 
and stop floods from washing away the harvest during the rainy season. The 
results have been dramatic.

Better irrigation and more security have allowed farmers like Ngo Kim Tan, 64 
years old, in Can Tho province, to plan ahead and plant more crops. Keeping salt 
water out has translated into tastier fruit and higher rice yields. Her rice 
yield has gone from about 700 kilos of rice per “cong” (1,000 m2) to about a 1 
ton per cong. Meanwhile the price of paddy has been multiplied by 1.5 in one 
year (from 3,000 VND per kilo to 4,500 VND – about 28 cents ofa US$ - this year).


Her income has doubled, she says. Feeling flush, she has decided to extend her 
house. The addition will go to whichever child gets married first. Inflation, 
though, is denting her happy bubble. The price of bottled gas has gone up 
drastically (from $12 to $20 per month) and so has the price of food she buys at 
the market.

The price of fertilizer, pesticide, fuel – and the uncertainties linked to 
climate, the environment and plain old luck, kept most farmers I talked to 
cautiously optimistic.

Doan Van Den, a 48 year old farmer whose land borders a secondary canal 
protected by a new sluice gate in Kien Giang province, spoke about his switch 
from harvesting rice once a year, to two crops of rice and one vegetable crop. 
Like his neighbors, he has seen his yield increase since the network of canals 
and gates has been completed. “Our income has increased. But when we grow rice 
more intensively, it costs more in fertilizer. We’ve benefited from prices going 
up but we’re still very poor.” The father of eight children sat in a simple 
thatched-roof house with a mud floor. He served us tea made with water from the 
murky Mekong River – there was no running water. “We can’t afford to fix the 
house yet.”


One farmer who tried growing three rice crops, suffered losses last season 
because of pests. “If you plant rice continuously it tires the land, so the 
yield is reduced,” said Trinh Van On, 53 years old, in Soc Trang province. “You 
need double the amount of pesticides and fertilizer for the third crop because 
the land is exhausted.”

As I traveled on the small roads and waterways that connect farmers to markets 
in the delta, I kept wondering how the environment would with-stand the pressure 
to grow more rice. If better irrigation allows rice intensification but 
intensification pollutes the very water that sustains the delta’s life and 
fields, how do you maintain a sound balance between food production and water 
quality?

The Ministry of Agriculture’s advice to farmers has been to stay away from rice 
intensification to keep pests and disease in check. Two rice crops and one cash 
crop allow the land to rest more than three rice crops with no break. The advice 
has been to reduce three inputs: the amounts of seeds, pesticide and fertilizer 
– by applying new seedling techniques, fertilizing land more accurately, and 
using water and other techniques to get rid of pests.

Since I’m no agricultural expert (more of an in-house journalist reporting on 
development impact), I wonder what safeguards are really in place to avert the 
kind of rush to solutions that have perverse effects so often. Will sustainable 
farming practices survive the pressure to produce more and more food? It would 
be nice to feed the planet without killing it…
-- 
Vern Weitzel (Mr.) BSc, BA, MA, M Env Man & Dev <vern at coombs.anu.edu.au>
<vern.weitzel at gmail.com> <vern at ngocentre.org.vn> <vernweitzel at mac.com>

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