IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-1

Research article
erd

Aspects of the Aging Farming Population and Food
Security in Agriculture for Thailand and Japan
SUPAPORN POUNGCHOMPU*
Faculty of Agriculture, Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen,, Thailand
Email: psuppap@kku.ac.th

KOBAYASHI TSUNEO
Coastal Bioenvironmental Center, Saga University, Saga, Japan

PONGSAGORN POUNGCHOMPU
Rajamangala University of Technology Isan, Khon Kaen, Thailand
Received 14 December 2011

Accepted 12 March 2012(*: Corresponding Author)

Abstract This paper highlights the aging farmer population and food security inagriculture, an issue for both Thailand and Japan. The increase of elderly population inboth countries is particularly marked in the agricultural labor force as the number ofagriculture labor force has continually decreased due to the exodus of young farmers fromagriculture. This has significantly impacted food security. The 152 Thai and 10 Japanese
respondents, consisting of farmers aged over 55 years were sampled using a purposive
sampling technique that was based on the interviewing survey carried out on AugustDecember 2011. For techniques of data analysis, the descriptive statistics and cohort
method were used. The results present an increasing trend of aged farming population andaging farmers mainly engaged in farming aging 65 and over in both countries. In case of
the increase in Japan, it can be explained by the number of post-retirement farmers. It isinteresting to note that the aging trend increases in number partly due to a slower rate ofexiting from farming. The disadvantage is that older farmers would be much less efficientin agriculture, especially rice cultivation. However, the role of maintaining a farm land canbe entrusted to the aging famers. From the survey, it was found that food insecurity is arisk due to a reduction of the farm labor force and the aging society. Yet, most farmers inboth countries believed that a shortage of farm labor force has probably not given rise to a
problem of food insecurity because in modern agriculture less labour is needed and the useof machinery is increasing. Thus, the government should improve access to modern
technology and machinery to increase efficiency for coping with the above situations.
Keywords older farmer, post-retirement farmer, population mainly engaged in farming,
cohort method, part-time farmer, full-time farmer

INTRODUCTION
In most countries, population aging tends to be greater in rural areas than in cities (Gerardo, 2005).
This is because rural-to-urban migration is usually highly age-selective, involving mostly young
adults who migrate to cities to seek urban employment (Gustavo, 2008). As a result, the population
left behind in the countryside typically have higher proportions of older people (Gerardo, 2005).
According to National Statistical Office (2011), in Thailand the agricultural population, over 65
year old occupied nearly 10% of the population. For Japan, over the 50-year period, from 1960 to2010, an annual rate of decrease of roughly 1.16% for farm household has brought the agricultural
population down to 6.50 million in 2010 (Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries(MAFF),2011). As the younger population has moved out of agriculture, the aging farming population hasbecome more prominent. Consequently, the agriculture sector will increase the reliance on theelderly population for labour. The aging of producers in the low capital-intensive agricultural
sectors of many developing countries could imply lowering of the productivity of labor (Philippe,Ⓒ ISERD102

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-12011). Probably labour productivity is one of the greatest stress areas that the rural exodus
exercises on the food stability of these countries.
To date, there has been little research into the aging farm labor force in Thailand and Japan.
This issue is a major problem for rural development, so there is a need for more research toquantify the current situation. Thus, this study has focused on the change in population
demographics as its impact on food security in both Thailand and Japan and the prospective role of
the aging population as a farm labor force for agricultural development.
METHODOLOGY
The research used secondary data to analyze the expected rural population and numbers predicted
to be engaged in farming for the next 25 years in both Thailand and Japan. It also used primary datafrom a survey carried out in Khon Kaen, Thailand in 4 villages; Nonkaow village, Wangto village,
Nontoon village and Tarae village; and in Tottori prefecture, Japan. A total of 162 respondents
made up of farmers aged over 55 years in Thailand and Japan were sampled using a purposive
sampling technique. 10 respondents from Japan also were members of Inaba Japan Agricultural
Cooperative (JA). This research was based on an interviewing survey that was carried out during
August-December 2011. For techniques of data analysis, the descriptive statistics and cohort
method were used. With a differentiation of data collection period, Japan began in 2005 (Uchida,1998) but Thailand since 2003 (National Statistical Office, 2011). For prediction, in Japan it can becalculated at provincial level as Tottori prefecture; but in Thailand, it must be forecasted on anational level due to a lack of data at provincial level. In case of the total number of agricultural
population,  less  than  14  years  has  been  estimated  according  to  Uchida’s  method  and  the  group  aged  over 75 years was compared with the general population aged over 75 years in Tottori province forJapan and in national level for Thailand (Uchida, 1998). This study also collected data from a
discussion with Japanese scholars and professors in Tottori University.
RESULTS
Current Situation and Tendency of Aging Population in Agriculture
According to the 2010 Census of Agriculture and Forestry (MAFF, 2011), in Japan, the number offarmers has fallen by half since the 1980s. The number of Japanese working in agriculture andforestry declined to 2.6 million in 2010, down from 5.43 million in 1985. The average age ofJapanese working in agriculture and forestry was 65.8 in 2010 (Figure 1-a). The rate of aging
population aged over 65 years increased by 34.3 % in 2010 compared to 8.2 % in 1960.
Thus, the total number of farm household members will have steeply fallen, as the number ofaging farmer household members will be rising. In Thailand, on the other hand, the aging farmers
have shown an increasing number of agricultural workforces from 4.5 % in 1980 to 16.7% in 2008
while agricultural workforce aged 15-39 represented the fallen proportion to 37.2 % in 2008. In
contrast to this group, the agricultural workforce aged 40-59 increase by 36.1 % in 2008 compared
to 27.4% in 1985 (Fig. 1-b). From this analysis, it can be concluded that the reduction in the young
farming labor force has had effects of rapidly aging of the agricultural workforce. Table 1 showedthat the rising portion of older farmers is due to an absolute increase in their numbers as well as asteady decrease in the number of farmers aged under 65 in both Japan and Thailand.
For Tottori prefecture, Japan, in the next 25 years the agricultural population aged over 65 isexpected to be reduced from 34,656 persons in 2005 to 33,743 persons in 2030; and from 74,468
persons in 2005 to 12,725 persons in 2030 for the population aged under 65. In contrast, for
Thailand, the total number of farming population aging under 65 is expected to decline from 18.07
million in 2003 to 16.64 million in 2028 or around 19% in 2003-2028. But the total agricultural
population and population mainly engaged in farming aging 65 and over has a greater number thanother age groups similar to Japan (Table 1). From this viewpoint, the aging trend is partly due to aslower rate of quitting from farming. Regarding Japan, the number of farmers aging 65 and overⒸ ISERD103

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-1

shows an increasing figure. This increase may indicate the number of post-retirement farmers1. The
post-retirement farmers can be classified into 3 categories based on pension income as follows:First, post-retirement farmer at early retirement age who are aged 50-54 years; Second, postretirement farmer at first period retirement age who are aged 55-59 years and Third, postretirement farmer at second period retirement age who are aged 60-69 years (Sawada, 2003;
Supaporn and Tsuneo, 2005). The number of post-retirement farmers began rising from the 1990s;
especially, in 2005-2010 period. This increase was due to the number of those who were born at thepeak period of births;;  the  post  war  “baby  boom”  of  1945-1949.

a) Japan, 2010b) Thailand, 2008

Fig. 1 Farming population by age group
Table 1 Prediction of the number of farming population and population mainly engaged infarming for the next 25 years for Tottori province of Japan and for national level ofThailand
Tottori Province, Japan (person)
farming population
population mainly engaged in farming

Agegroup
Under30
30-54
55-64
Over65
Total

2005
29735

2010
17454

201511469

2020
7836

20255714

2030
4246

2005
2551

2010
1044

2015
619

2020
438

2025
332

2030
251

30481
14252
34656

20378
16309
32528

13624
14169
35023

9584
9400
38312

7107
5259
37266

5064
3415
33743

4439
7050
27031

2681
6743
22965

1794
5281
22081

1360
3088
22451

1166
1833
21253

979
1283
19955

109124

86669

74285

65132

55346

46468

40171

33433

29775

27337

24584

22468

2003
7482

2008
5711

2013
6496

2018
5940

2023
6144

2028
5992

2003
1077

2008
616

2013
1057

2018
679

2023
1081

2028
1029

8037
2154
3587

11053
2082
3867

8663
1986
4454

2947
574
320

2653
609
255

3412
548
291

2442
550
349

3780
573
393

2193
502
449

19718

23146

21095

4918

4133

5308

4020

5827

4173

Thailand (1000 persons)
Under
30
30-54
8697
8538 10482
55-64
1894
2496
1936
Over
1560
2050
2775
65
Total
19633 18795 21689
Source:  author’s  calculation

Older farmers in agriculture of Japan
From the survey applied to 10 respondents, the majority of the farmers were averagely 66.7 years
old. Seven were high school graduates and only three farmers were college graduates. The average
number of family members who reside together was 2 but most households involved in farming are
elderly couples that can receive some assistance from the children who live in the cities and returnhome on holidays like Golden Week. The type of farming work for households can be divided into1

The post-retirement farmer is defined as farm household members who mainly engage in a non-farming job and change to only afarming job after retiring from a non-farming job.

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104

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-12 categories as follows: (1) part time farmers; that is, farmers who regularly do non-farm jobs but
help farming on weekends (Saturday and Sunday). They do farming part time before retiring fromtheir regular jobs; and then, after retiring they work as full time farmers. These farmers generate
income from not only their pension but also their farming job. The share of pension amounts tomore than 50% of total income. (2) Full time farmers; that is, farmers who work in farming job
before and after 60 years as full time farmers. Of the 10 farmers, most have changed from part time
farmers to full time farmers. They are post-retirement farmers at second period retirement age whohave been working as farmers for around 6-7 years after retirement and will expect to do farming
activities for around 10 years more. Only 3 farmers have always been full time farmers, and havefarming experience of 45 years. They intend to continue farming for next 10-15 years. The
motivation of this farmer type is to protect their land because they have no successor to continue
farming. Moreover, most landholdings are small in size of 2.53 ha for rice paddies and of 2 ha for
upland fields (Table 2). There are four types of agricultural cultivation; that is, rice-vegetable, ricevegetable-flower, vegetable-flowers and vegetable that are operated by four, one, two and one
farmers respectively. The fruits grown are persimmon, plum and lemon and the vegetables grown
are tomato, Japanese radish, kidney bean and goya etc. Only two farmers grow flowers for salesuch as pansy and lily. They grew rice once a year due to a very cold winter, and they worked 6.5hours/day in planting period and 8 hours/day in harvesting period. They also cultivate crops inurban areas around houses, making vegetable plots and then bringing their small amount ofproducts to sell through Japan Agricultural Cooperative (JA). As above mentioned, the farm size ofrice paddy is small leading to be much less efficiency in agriculture. However, the older farmers
have been conservative on rice cultivation leading to slow down in the number of farm households
growing rice. They expand the area of their farm land through the use of rental lands.
Table 2 Farm size of landholding and cultivated area in Japan
Farm size(ha)0.1-0.3
0.4-0.6
0.6-0.9
1.0-3.0
3.0-6.0

Landholding (No, %)Paddy field
Upland field
1(10)
2 (20)
4 (40)
4 (40)
3 (30)
3 (30)Rice
1 (10)
4 (40)
2 (20)

Cultivated Area (ha, %)Vegetable
Flower2 (20)
1 (10)
2 (20)
1 (10)
3 (30)
1 (10)
2 (20)Fruit
1 (10)
1 (10)
1 (10)

Older farmers in agriculture in Thailand
For over 90% of farm households, farming is the main occupation. The remainders have non-farmjobs as main jobs. The average age of farmers is 63.5 years. 5.3% (8 households), four farmers
previously worked in non-farm jobs as government workers and after retirement entered into
farming. These farmers moved from part time farmers to full time farmers. Three farmers worked
in factories and after reaching the age of 55 and over, changed to farming. Formerly, they helped
farming activities such as rice harvesting. Just one farmer has had a small private business while
doing a farming job until now. The motivation of continuing farming activities is being successors(42.8%), generating income (3.2%), occupying a farm land (38.2%), and no successor (15.8%).
Regarding the size of landholding, most farmers have 1.0-2.99 ha and only five households have abigger size of land. Just two households do not own land. Most farmers grow rice with less than 1.0
ha, while a small number grows either cassava or sugarcane in areas less than 1.0 ha and 1.0-2.99
ha respectively (Table 3). Although they do farming with small size lands, they can protect farmlands from other sectors same as Japan and also support farm activities especially rice cultivation,
leading to be conservative rice cultivation farmers like Japan. With most of the farmers growing
rice in a single crop, this research has focused on the number of working days and hours as shownin Table 4. It was found that they mostly used working days and hours in transplanting, applying
fertilizer and harvesting. The main farm labor force is the farming couple but their children helptransplanting and harvesting. Also, some households have hired labor and used machinery intransplanting and harvesting.
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IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-1

Table 3 Farm size of landholding and cultivated area in Thailand
Farm size(ha)<1.0
1.0-2.99
3.0-5.99
6.0-9.0

Landholding(No, %)
34 (22.4)
84 (55.3)
27 (17.8)
5 (3.3)

Rice
72 (47.3)
68 (44.7)
6 (3.9)-Cultivated Area (No, %)Cassava
Sugarcane
9 (5.9)10 (6.6)5 (3.3)12 (7.9)
2 (1.3)5 (3.3)-Table 4 Average number of working days and working hours for a single crop
Activities
Soil preparation
Transplanting
Applying fertilizer
Weed control
Harvesting

Number (day)
3.89
5.31
5.45
3.93
6.43

Number (hour/day)
1.61
5.56
2.06
1.83
5.61

Older farmers and food security for Japan and Thailand
The opinion of aging farmers in both countries regarding the food security issue was that foodsecurity is an issue caused by the reduction of farm labor force and the aging society. However,most believed that the shortage of farm labor has not actually given rise to a problem of foodsecurity as modern agriculture needs smaller labor force and the shortage of labor can be coveredby the use of modern machinery. In addition, the impact of high oil prices has partly led to foodinsecurity because food prices are increasingly corresponding to the price of oil. This is also
because of a rise in production costs, such as fertilizers. Another factor is the increasing demand
due to the increase of population and income (Table 5). In the same table it was found that no
significant difference in opinion of food security in agriculture could be detected between Japanand Thailand. As above mentioned, Thai farmers have recommended that the production patternshould be diversified by growing crops other than main crops such as perennials  while Japanesefarmers thought that they should change commercial production to sustainable production; that is,increasing crop diversification to increase self-reliance leading to be a source of food support forconsumers.
Table 5 Opinion of food security in agriculture for Japan and Thailand
Items
Increasing aging farmer
Impact of high oil prices
Shortage of farm labor
Increasing demandTotalJapan
Frequency Percentage(%)
34011053011010100

ThailandFrequency Percentage
(%)
49
32.24
2717.766844.74
85.26
152
100

Test of Difference*
2.047ns*

Difference was compared using chi-square test; ns = non-significant

DISCUSSION
With an increasing trend of aging farming population, agriculture and rural development will be
increasingly encouraged by older persons (Gustavo, 2008). Older farmers have expansive
knowledge and experience of agricultural production that are conservative traditional agricultural
practices and they can transfer their experience to young farmers in spite of that older farmers areless incentive for investment and innovation in agriculture (Stloukal, 2000) and are slower to adapt
to the change in agriculture (Siamwalla, 2004). In other words, the aging of producers in the low
capital-intensive agricultural sectors could imply a lowering of the productivity of labor (Philippe,Ⓒ ISERD106

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2012) 3-12011). However, the role of maintaining farm land can be entrusted to the aging famers withsupport from outside and use of mechanization. Thus, governments should improve thetechnological and crop seed development as well as machinery availability to increase production
efficiency to offset production decreasing.
CONCLUSION
Population aging 65 and over has an upward trend in both counties. Older farmers in both countries
have played a key role of farm land maintenance involving rice cultivation. In order to maintainfood security both Thai and Japanese farmers should increase crop diversification other than main
crops.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This research is supported by The Sumitomo foundation. The author is sincerely grateful toAssociate Professor Kumi Yasunobu and scholars in Tottori University for the assistance of farmsurvey and valuable discussion.
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