Norman Borlaug, father of the Green Revolution, came to Thailand two weeks earlier to promote GMOs. From past experience, Day-ene is not at all convinced GMOs are the way ahead. Farmer after farmer made passionate and at times angry contributions from the floor. Jasmine rice is losing fragrance because the Ministry of Agriculture is promoting new varieties. The new varieties cross with the old and make them lose fragrance.
Farmers are in debt because merchants reduce the price for the loss of fragrance.
We must revive traditional varieties and the Government must raise the price of traditional varieties. Lots of fragrant rice used to be planted but the Government developed varieties for export and emphasized yield, so farmers stopped planting fragrant rice varieties. To conserve rice varieties, the Government must buy different varieties. Farmers confirmed that the use of pesticides and fertilizers resulted in many diseases, while traditional varieties never gave so many problems. They also pointed out that the benefit of rice planting is that it provided food and feed for animals as well as a surplus for selling on the market.