Forces and Influences behind the Development of Upland Cash Cropping in North-East Thailand

Bibliographic Data

ID4702007
AuthorsJonathan Riggs (0000-0002-6563-4640, corresponding author)
Year1987
Volume153
Issue3
Pages370
Publication date1987-11-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueGeographical Journal (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0016-7398 • E-ISSN: 1475-4959
PublisherJSTOR (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/633674
OpenAlexW2321843656
LanguageEN
Citations received15
References cited9

systems. This paper traces the spread of cash cropping in the North-Eastern region of Thailand since the end of the Second World War and attempts to identify the forces that have driven the development. The impact of infrastructural improvements upon the desire and the ability of farmers to engage in cash cropping is examined, and the government role in this process is assessed. In addition, changes in the cropping pattern are looked at in relation to varying relative prices for the crops in question. Finally, the role of the private sector in the commercialization of agriculture is examined. It is argued that the spread of cash cropping would have been far less rapid and pervasive in the absence of the private sector. WHEN SIR JOHN BOWRING visited Thailand in 1855 he found a kingdom which had studiously shunned contact with the West, deliberately avoiding both commercial and diplomatic relations (Bowring, 1969). The economy ofthe nation and the well-being of its inhabitants was founded upon the cultivation of rice, almost entirely for subsistence consumption or local barter. In the vicinity of the capital, Bangkok (Fig. 1). there had evolved a limited commercial sector supplying the court and population of that city, and the kingdom had been intermittently exporting rice from at least the beginning of the seventeenth century (Ingram, 1971). However, Siam had few trading links, and even villages close to Bangkok were enclosed and self-sufficient communities surrounded by a 'wilderness' of forest and swamp (Sharp

Agriculture · Agroforestry · Archaeology · Business · Cash · Cash crop · Cropping · Geography · Environmental Science · Social and Economic Development in India · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies · World Systems and Global Transformations