Farm Models of Sustainable Development for Novice Farmers in Thailand

Abstract

The objective of this project was to study farm models which were appropriate for farm production according to the guidelines of sufffifiificient economy philosophy for novice farmers in Thailand. The farm land of Sukhumvit Assets Management, Co. Ltd. in Chombueng District, Ratchaburi Province was used as the pilot project. The farm models for the novice farmers in the project were built as follows: (1) Each farmer would be allocated three rais of land. (2) All farmers would be provided credits from the ffifiifinancial institution to pay for the cost of land and infrastructure. (3) Three rais of land of each farmer would be divided into 3 plots as follows: The ffifiifirst plot-used for building a house, crop farming, and raising animals. The second plot-used for planting herbs such as fragrant plai, turmuric, lemon grass, and onion. The third plot-used for planting trees, fragrant mango, and sweet bamboo. From the result of analysis, there were only 7 from 40 farm models that showed higher return on investment than the opportunity cost of the capital fund at 8 percents, and suitable to be farm models for the novice farmers.