News from Thailand – September 28, 2012
Until the third week of October, Bangkok gets heavy rains. The culprit is a monsoon trough that lingers over the southern part of the Central Plains, the East and the northern part of the South.
This month alone, Bangkok received 721 mm of rain, breaking the record of 20 mm set 679,2 years ago. The sharp increase in rainfall brings Bangkok's total rainfall to 157 cm, well above the annual average of 150 cm.
The situation raises concerns because the sewers in Bangkok are not designed for the enormous amount of rainwater that falls in a short time and the water level in the Pasak Jolasid reservoir in Lop Buri and Saraburi, which is now 67 percent full. Rainwater in Bangkok's sewers flows too slowly into canals and underground tunnels. And in some places the sewers are clogged, municipal spokesman Wasan Meewong admits.
In the South, heavy rains caused flooding in four districts in Phangnga province. Houses, a bridge and fields were destroyed. Two districts in Ranong province were also hit.
– The identity of the three excavated skeletons in the orchard of Dr. Death, as police doctor Supat Laohawattana is nicknamed, has not yet been determined. Two are of the male sex, the sex of the third is difficult to determine because it is incomplete.
DNA testing is still in progress. The DNA of one skeleton does not match that of the couple, who disappeared without a trace in 2009. The results of the DNA testing of the other two will be announced today.
The investigators have established with near certainty that these are two men aged 17 to 18 and 40 to 50 respectively, and one aged 18 to 19. They must have been killed more than a year ago. A bullet hole was found in the older man's skull.
The investigators are meeting today to discuss the results of the forensic and DNA tests. The suspect will likely be charged with first-degree murder on that basis. [For more details see earlier issues of News from Thailand.]
– For the second time, the recalcitrant red shirt leader Jatuporn Prompan was sentenced to a suspended prison sentence of six months with a probationary period of two years for defamatory remarks about then Prime Minister Abhisit.
This time it concerns comments he made about the army's actions against red shirt protesters in 2010. In July, it was about the accusation that Abhisit had no respect for the king because he had spoken to the king during an audience on an equal footing.
Another defamation case was dismissed by the Criminal Court yesterday. This concerned Jatuporn's accusation that Abhisit evaded military service. According to the court, Abhisit could not convincingly prove that he was exempt from military service and therefore Jatuporn, then a member of parliament, had the right to comment on this.
– Two students in a school bus were injured when a roadside bomb exploded in Yi-ngo (Narathiwat) yesterday. The authorities suspect that the bomb was intended for the excorting soldiers. The school has suspended classes indefinitely.
At the end of last year, the headmaster and his assistant were shot at at the entrance of the school. The headmaster was injured and his assistant was killed.
In the district of Raman (Yala), a bomb exploded in a rubber plantation. Casualties have not been reported. Two unexploded bombs were also found.
At a meeting in Pattani yesterday, the creation of a broad-based committee to take the lead in talks with surrender rebels was discussed. Earlier, 93 persons in Narathiwat surrendered.
The fresh food market in Pattani was closed today due to rumors that it would be attacked.
– In Pattaya City, the police arrested three ladyboys (transvestites). They drugged a tourist and stole his money and belongings worth 1 million baht. After a night out on Walking Street, the man had taken the boys to his hotel room. He became unconscious after drinking a glass of beer.
Economic news
– The Oishi Group, known for its green tea, is considering building a third factory in Saraburi to spread the risks arising from, among other things, flooding. Oishi has a production unit on Nava Nakorn Industrial Estate in Pathum Thani, which was flooded last year, and one on Amata Nakorn Industrial Estate in Chon Buri.
In Pathum Thani, machinery has already been moved to a higher floor and to a warehouse to be prepared for possible flooding. Part of the green tea production has moved to Chon Buri.
The factory at Nava Nakorn is expected to return to full capacity in the fourth quarter. This week, Oishi introduced green tea in a glass bottle, the first in Thailand.
– It continues to muddle with the Saha Rattana Nakorn industrial estate in the province of Ayutthaya. The temporary dike around the site is not yet ready, the concrete for the permanent dike still has to be poured and, to make matters worse, the electricity failed on Tuesday.
The companies are not convinced that flooding can be prevented. Some companies have already decided to move elsewhere next year. Of the 43 factories, 70 percent have fully resumed production.
The temporary 6,5 kilometer long dike will be raised to 7,5 meters above mean sea level. That dike should be ready in three weeks. The construction has been delayed due to a row between the site manager and the Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand. After mediation by Minister Pongsvas Svasti (Industry), the construction team was replaced by a team from the army.
The flood walls on the other industrial estates in Ayutthaya and Pathum Thani, which were flooded last year, have largely been constructed.
– Thai AirAsia wants to add four to five Chinese cities per year to its network in the coming years. According to director Tassapon Bijleveld journey The Chinese are increasingly going abroad, they have more money to spend and the country has an open-sky policy. In October, TAA already started a service to Wuhan in central China and in November to Xi'an, famous for its terracotta army.
There are few expansion opportunities for TAA in the ten countries of ASEAN because about 90 percent of the cities, where there is a demand for air transport, are already served. Only Siem Raep (Cambodia), Vientiane (Laos) and Manila (Philippines) are still missing.
Expansion to cities in India, which was the plan 2 years ago, is not going smoothly, because it is not easy to obtain landing rights from the Indian authorities.
– The Industrial Estate Authority of Thailand (IEAT) is appealing against the halting of plans for the Rayong Eco-Industrial Zone. At the request of the Stop Global Warming Association, the administrative court gave a red light because the mandatory health and environmental impact assessment had not been done. The site would also cause water scarcity and pollution.
But that report has been done and has already been approved by the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, says Chansin Treenuchagron, vice president of IRPC, the chemical arm of state oil company PTT Plc, with the IEAT initiator of the site. "We are just waiting for an official announcement from the IEAT."
The industrial estate will have an area of 2.098 rai, half of which will be used for green industries, such as sustainable energy, electronics and agricultural companies. The other half is for planting and facilities. It is expected that the development of the infrastructure can start in the second half of next year.
– The head of the Thailand Development Research Institute (TDRI) joins a group of academics who have asked the Constitutional Court to end the controversial rice mortgage system. According to academics from the National Institute of Development Administration (Nida) and Thammasat University, the mortgage system is unconstitutional and has cost the state 98 billion baht so far.
The aim of the application to the Court is not so much to completely destroy the mortgage system, says Adis Israngkura, dean of Nida's School of Development Economics, but to change it so that losses are avoided in the next harvest season. Under the petition are the signatures of 119 people.
The petitioners rely on Article 84 of the Constitution, which guarantees free trade and prohibits the government from competing with private companies except in an emergency. According to them, the government violates this article by buying up the rice from the farmers at above market prices. Moreover, the rice is bought regardless of its quality, so that farmers no longer have an incentive to improve quality. And when the rice is stored for a long time, the quality deteriorates even further.
The Nida proposes to pay a maximum of 10.000 baht per ton instead of the current 15.000 (white rice) and 20.000 baht (Hom Mali) and to maximize the volume per family at 25 tons. "There's nothing wrong with the mortgage system in general, but what the government is doing now, buying up every grain and paying 35 to 40 percent more than the market price, is wrong," says Adis.
According to the TDRI, it is mainly merchants and millers who benefit from the system, collecting 63 percent of the government budget. The rest goes to farmers and only 5 percent goes to poor farmers in the Northeast. About 2 million of the 3,8 million rice farmers offer their rice, most of whom have large plots. Small farmers hardly benefit from the system.
The Thai Rice Exporters Association (TREA) has not yet decided whether to join the Court. Exporters want to wait until the end of the year to see how the system will affect exports. So far, the private sector has exported 6 million tons of rice, up from 10,65 million tons last year. Those figures do not include the rice that the government has exported from its own stock. The Department of Commerce said it recently signed contracts with other governments for 7,3 million tons.
'We're talking about shipments of millions of tonnes of rice to be exported. There should be some movement. But many ports are deadly quiet. This is impossible', says Chookiat Ophaswongse, honorary president of TREA.
– [This report comes from the newspaper of September 27.] The mortgage system for rice violates Article 84 of the constitution, says a group of academics led by Adis Issarangkul na Ayutthaya, dean of the School of Development Economics. The group asked the Constitutional Court on Wednesday to ban the system.
In the mortgage system, the government buys rice from farmers at prices 40 percent above market prices.
Article 84, which the academics invoke, reads: 'The state shall refrain from the engagement in an enterprise in competition with the private sector unless it is necessary for the purpose of maintaining the security of state, preserving common interests or providing public utilities. '
The Commerce Department sees no conflict with the article because the system's goal is to increase farmers' incomes, and "that's the majority in the country," said Somchart Sroythong, deputy director general of the Internal Trade Department.
Rice exporters say upper market prices have caused Thailand's rice exports to drop 45 percent this year, as rice from India and Vietnam is much cheaper. Thai rice costs $577 per ton, while rice from Vietnam and India costs $455 and $440 respectively. The exporters also accuse the government of only selling rice from their own stock in dribs and drabs, as a result of which the supply in the market is limited.
The government tried to auction 586.000 tons last week, but only succeeded for 57.605 tons, because prices were too low.
www.dickvanderlugt.nl – Source: Bangkok Post