Sitanon Jesdapipat
Faculty of Economics, Chulalongkorn University,
Phya Thai Road, Bangkok 10330, Thailand.
Economic prosperity in Thailand has resulted in a tremendous increase in demand for meat and dairy products. Rapid expansion and modernisation of the local livestock industry, particularly in the pig and poultry sectors, have met this demand. Exports of pigs and poultry have also risen sharply in the last few years and contributed significantly to national export earnings. Expansion of the livestock industry has encouraged the local production of feedgrain, mainly by large Thai conglomerates, and has thus benefited many local entrepreneurs. In addition, there have been many spin-offs, such as savings in feedgrain imports, creation of jobs, increase in incomes of the rural population, and development of other related industries that have benefited the people of Thailand.
Success, however, has not been without a price. In Thailand, as is the case of most developing countries,
resource and land-use planning is not carefully conducted or effectively implemented. Consequently, the benefits
experienced by the livestock industry are often over-shadowed by social conflicts and negative environmental impacts
resulting from intensive livestock rearing near urban areas. Intensive pig farms located close to metropolitan
Bangkok have resulted in enormous waste disposal problems and aroused the concern of the urban population living
close to such production areas. This paper draws upon the findings of a study conducted in two provinces bordering
metropolitan Bangkok (Nakorn Pathom and Chacheongsao), where intensive livestock industries have developed to
supply the needs of the urban population in Bangkok.
The problems caused by these peri-urban intensive livestock
industries are examined, and approaches and measures to relocate animal production and processing to non-urban
areas are discussed.
Thai tradition and culture have always been closely associated with water because it is seen to provide food, transport and economic prosperity to the Thai people. Human settlements have largely developed along waterways and riverbanks, and livestock rearing has become fully integrated into such communities. The rivers and waterways also provide an excellent means of transport for goods and people. Rearing animals close to water transport routes allows for lower production costs, and the ability to deliver fresh meat and livestock products to markets without incurring losses due to spoilage. This is important in Thailand where cold storage facilities, which are crucial for preserving the quality of meat and meat products, are insufficient or lacking in many rural areas.
However, the location of traditional livestock industries next to rivers and waterways has also resulted in uncontrolled discharge of waste from rearing and processing operations into the waterways. Because of the complex situation where livestock rearing is traditionally located with human settlements along waterways, the problems arising have not been easy to address and solve.
Integration of crops and livestock has always been a traditional component of the farming system in Thailand. However, in recent years, the traditional mixed crop-livestock farming system has been rapidly displaced by intensive and modern monoculture livestock production systems. This shift was in response to the high demand by a rapidly growing and affluent urban population for quality meat and dairy products. Intensive pig and poultry production, in particular, were made possible and promoted by the introduction of improved animal breeds, superior production technology, the availability of concentrated feed, and government-aided livestock development projects.
Intensive pig and poultry operations began to be located in peri-urban areas of Bangkok because proximity to the city was an important consideration in delivery and supply to urban markets. Two provinces adjacent to Bangkok, Nakhon Pathom and Chacheongsao, were the sites where intensive livestock production consequently began to develop. Both these provinces were traditional areas for mixed crop-livestock farming in the past. With the increase in demand for livestock products in Bangkok, however, the traditional farms were transformed into intensive production systems.
The rapid economic growth that has occurred in Thailand in recent years has had an important bearing on development and land use in these two provinces. Nakhon Pathom is situated in the lower Ta Chin river basin, 56 km to the south of Bangkok. The population in the province grew at an annual rate of 2.44% over the period of 1987 to 1993. The high price of land in the inner areas of Bangkok coupled with the increasing demand for housing from the low- to middle-income segment of the population is expected to induce major real estate and housing developments in Nakhon Pathom province. Likewise, Chachoengsao province has grown rapidly from both agricultural and industrial investments. Increasingly, urban development projects are being sited close or next to intensive livestock production operations in Nakhon Pathom and Chachoengsao provinces and, as expected, the various environmental and human health problems associated with such development are beginning to surface in Thailand.
The inadequate legal framework in Thailand has contributed significantly to the inability to resolve environmental problems and conflicts that arise from intensive livestock production near congested human settlements. With the exception of the municipality of urban Bangkok, there is no law that regulates livestock rearing in or near domestic residences in suburban and rural areas. Furthermore, there are inadequate provisions in the existing law that requires the livestock industry to address the environmental impact of their operations. Lax enforcement of existing regulations also contributes to the problem.
The are four possible models to accommodate sustainable management of the environmental aspects of livestock production in Thailand.
Livestock rearing originated in individual farms that existed as independent units in family compounds. Even less than half a decade ago, pig farming in Thailand was largely managed as small independent units. However, today only a limited number of small individual farms continue to exist. Small individual farms cannot compete with the large commercial operations, which are highly cost efficient and possess many production and marketing advantages over the smaller ones. Whether to and how to sustain the survival of traditional livestock production systems in Thailand is a difficult problem that have to be dealt with.
Some individual farms continue to operate profitably because they have switched to using improved animal breeds, concentrated feed, and efficient management practices introduced by agricultural companies. However, the transfer of new technology has been limited to increasing production efficiency only, and waste disposal and pollution have not been included. As a result, individual pig farms have become a serious source of water pollution, foul odours, noise, infectious diseases and annoying insects to the residents in surrounding areas. These farms face intense pressures from the local community to relocate, to quit the operation or to seek other alternative options, all of which are not possible to implement suddenly.
One option proposed is that of "voluntary migration." Forced to deal with environmental problems and conflicts with local communities, a few farms in Chiangmai and Lampoon provinces are relocating to the lowly populated provinces of Amphoe Maetha and Lampoon. Such a move is encouraged by lower prices of land and isolation from urban communities. However, this is a short-term measure to solve current problems as waste treatment and pollution controls have not been planned and included in these relocated pig industries.
Contract farming is an agreement between farmers and corporations, where production is contracted to the farmers and the corporations buy back the produce at a guaranteed price. A decade ago, when pig farming yielded high financial returns, this type of farming contract was very popular, but it has become less popular today because of the narrow profit margins.
An important issue relating to contract farming is that environmental costs are not stipulated in the contract, and neither are they factored into the contracted price. Both the farmers and the corporations tend to treat environmental costs as external to the production system. However, if and when the issue of pollution arises, it is the farmers who ultimately have to bear the brunt of public protests and the costs associated with waste disposal and pollution treatment.
Although contract farming is not so popular now as it was in the past because of the narrow profit margins obtained by farmers, it still continues to be a production system for pigs in Thailand. However, a production system that is indifferent to waste and pollution controls will become increasingly difficult to sustain in the future with mounting pressure from the public for greater social and environmental responsibility and accountability.
Cooperatives are gatherings of individuals to carry out either single-purpose or multi-purpose business activities. The grouping is voluntary and benefits the group by providing economies of scale as well as increasing bargaining power of the members.
The Cooperatives Law in Thailand allows for a minimum of 8 individuals to establish a cooperative by registering their business enterprise with the Department of Cooperative Promotion (DCP), in the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives. Currently, there are 54 pig-farming cooperatives with about 30 000 members in Thailand.
Management of environmental problems arising from pig farming is left to individual members of each cooperative. At the most, the cooperative may recommend some treatments for specific problems (e.g. chemical sprays for foul odours) but it is not active in promoting waste and pollution controls, unless pressured by the government. Pig-farming cooperatives mainly provide marketing services, and any advisory role they play is limited to those affecting profits alone. The main problem with each member acting independently is that environmental problems are not addressed uniformly and are not given priority in the production process.
The concept of livestock estate management was suggested in 1995 to help solve environmental problems caused by the livestock industry in Chachoengsao Province. As a follow up to this initiative, the Pollution Control Department, Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment, has commissioned a group of researchers at Kasetsart University to assess pig production within the framework of an industrial estate with the following objectives in mind:
1.To determine the size and feasibility of establishing a pig production plant that integrates rearing, slaughterhouse and waste treatment into one facility;
2.To create an administrative approach to commercial pig rearing that encompasses care, treatment and prevention of diseases, control standards for pigs, general pollution control, and commercial management of pigs; and
3.To provide guidelines for the preparation of documents to be used for tendering water treatment systems, and control and management of pig waste.
Ultimately, the project hopes to create a sustainable and environmental-friendly system for pig rearing, treating and handling of solid and liquid waste, and utilisation of waste for biogas production, fertiliser and feed for fish in sedimentary ponds.
In contrast to the government-initiated project, the commercial sector has already established an integrated pig rearing estate in Nongwha Agricultural Village (NAV) in Chachoengsao Province. Fifty farmers (households) who did not own any land were recruited in 1977, and each of them was allocated approximately 4 ha of land on which pig rearing was integrated with mango cultivation. The idea was to utilise all the pig waste to fertilise the mango trees, instead of disposing the waste into waterways and rivers. The NAV project was financed by low-interest agricultural loans, totalling 25 million Baht. Each household was guaranteed a minimum monthly income of 2 000 Baht.
The NAV project was divided into three phases. The first phase was heavily subsidised through contract farming, with minimum income and prices guaranteed. All raw materials and animal feed were provided at subsidised prices. In the second phase, the ownership of land was transferred to the farmers, who then had to establish their own marketing cooperatives and deal on commercial terms with the central buyer. Farmers in the third phase of the project have to be completely self-reliant and not assisted by any subsidy. The final phase is indeed an acid test of the viability of this project.
The project has just entered its second phase, and is perceived as a financial success with respect to pig production, but the waste disposal and environmental issues have still not been totally resolved. The attempt to get farmers to use all of their pig waste to fertilise the mango trees and derive a further income from mango has met with limited success. Farmers prefer to rear pigs alone because of the high amount of labour required in mango cultivation, and the stable and continuous income obtained from pig rearing. Thus, waste and environmental problems are still left to individual farms to handle, but do not appear to be a problem because the estate is currently isolated from other communities. It is hoped that financial success and joint management may encourage members of this estate to deal with environmental problems in the long run.
It has become apparent from the NAV experience that in order for integrated livestock estates to fully encompass environmental issues in their operations, three additional elements are necessary. Firstly, financial incentives such as low-interest loans should be provided to enhance competitiveness and ensure a stable and guaranteed minimum income for farmers. Secondly, some preferential treatment and incentives are needed to induce migration of existing pig farms into the estate, and to operationalise environmental infrastructure. The principle of fiscal neutrality is proposed here to finance the whole scheme so that pollution charges are used to maintain the system. Finally, institutional support in the form of standards and regulations are needed to serve as a guide to officials administering environmental pollution and protection.
