Farmers aided by fertiliser price freeze

After meeting with farmers and the Internal Trade Department, Plengsakdi Prakaspesat, president of the Thai Fertiliser and Agricultural Marketing Associa-tion, said that producers could only freeze prices for a short period as they are also facing rising raw-material costs.

To ensure that farmers and fertiliser producers would not be affected by rising production costs, he called on the government to initiate fair measures to control prices as well as closely monitor price speculation by other wholesalers and retailers.

Prasit Boonchuey, president of the Thai Farmers Association, said that farmers have seen a rise in production costs due to costly fertilisers and pesticides. Against Bt13,000 per tonne early this year, fertilisers now cost Bt21,000 to Bt22,000 per tonne.

"Farming costs have increased from Bt5,690 per tonne to more than Bt7,000 per tonne of production. If fertiliser producers can freeze their retail prices it would decrease the burden on farmers," said Prasit.

Meanwhile, Siripol Yodmuangcharoen, permanent secretary of the Commerce Ministry, yesterday said the ministry may need to revise its inflation target soon if oil prices keep rising with the consequent effect on the price of consumer goods.

The ministry raised its inflation estimate from 3 to 3.5 per cent to 5 to 5.5 per cent last month. This was based on an average oil price of US$120 (Bt3,825) up from $85 per barrel in the original forecasts.