CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. This study is entitled " Au Economic Survey of the Rural Problems in Siam." However, in fact it is much more than an economic survey, and from the peculiar nature of the country, its application is much broader than to the country districts of Siam. Consequently, at the beginning of the work, it is essential to outline in detail thc exact nature and purposes of the study. NATURE OF THE STUDY. The first purpose of the study is to show the relationship of rural life in Siam to national security and development and <1vice versa.>1 It interests itself in the economic life of the country people because country people compose the dominant element in the national life of Siam and because their prosperity and living conditions determine, to a large exteut, the prosperity and security of the nation. This condition is not unique to Siam. Many other countries in Asia and in the Western World are likewise dependent upon the condition of their country people; as a mattcr of fact, even the most urban nations, sooner or later find their economic and social condition determined by the economic and social conditions in their rural hinterlands. On account of the high purpose of this study, and because of the great care and thought that has been given to the collection of in- formation, to its analysis, and to the preparation of a national pro- gram for development, it is to be hoped that the public will take this work with great seriousness and give the work a great deal of thought. On the other hand, if in the pressure of the great amount of work, necesaitated by such a huge program as has becn ours, some facts have been overlooked or misinte. brleted, it is holoed that the reade will not hastity cast asidc the whole work but only those parts that are evidently faulty, and that he will bear with the rest as a Walid prograiu for the movement of the nationial brosbcrity aud futurc development of Siam. FurTher, it is to be hoped that if some of our conclusious disagree with those reachcd by other persons, with particular and specitic interests in the national dewelopment of Siam, wc hope the study of this Cominission will not be thrown away completely. Humau life is very complex. This Comumssion has tried to look at Siamese national development, not only from the grounds of <1what needs to be done>1 but from the standpoint of <1earm be>1 done, and what can be done considering the human aml economic limitations which exist in every country, particulaily smce the recent economic crisis iu world affairs. Before proceeding furthcr, it is necessary to say that the making of this study, and the nature of the facts found aud pre- sented in this documeut, is no reflection upou the Siamlese natiou. Ouly a country hiphly advanced in civilization, and with a proressilwe and capable Goverment such as that which cxists iu Siam is willing to study its own problems frankly aud to attempt to plau national developmeut according to an orderly economic program. As our rcsult will show later, Siam has no reason to be ashamed of the progress she has made. This is a couutry with a highly developed civilization an exccedingly capable and strong Gocrumeut, economic resources already highly delielopcd and high ambitions for the future. The average incomle and the average of living conditions, considering every factor, are already higher than those of the other countries ou the main land of Asia. 1f it is suffering from under- bopulapion, from too high a death-rate or from an under-develor- ment of ecouomic techuitluc iu certain lincs, these acks iu deve- lopmcnt may be casily explaiued by the peculiar conditions which have haudicapped the country along certaiu lines. If certain lines of agricultural productiou are morc exteusive, as contrasted with intensive, iu Siam than in other countries of Asia it is to be remembered that each nation and each agricultural civilizatiOn can only use that combination of the factOrs of production which it has at hand. The problem of developmeut of the agricul- tural and rural resources of Siam is only a problem of primary physical suffering among the people----it is a problcm of opportunity for the future. A national income such as exists in Siam at the present, meets the nceds of the people of the present. But a greater the population, will be followcd by increascd needs, by increased economic desires and by greater national opportunitics for develop- ment. The next characteristic of this present study is that it repre- sents more or less thc naturc of <1a preliminary study upon rather>1 <1a broad scale.>1 It is to be hoped that this study is not the last, but rather <1an humble beginning to a large number of specialized>1 <1studies,>1 each helping in its little way to increase the national development and thc national income. In this study many factors are taken into consideration, each from thc standpoint of a specialist in that particular linc. This study covers such factors as income in money, income in goods of nature, agricultural methods, marketing of agricultural products, credit for agriculture, health, diet, regional economic problems and othcr important and pertinent factors. At the same time, although many specialists have been involved in thc study, as a whole it represents the work of an integrated group and it is presented as a Commission study, each individual item of which is given thc entire support and weight of the whole Commission. This study was a coopcrative one from the very beginning. No single individual could withdraW from the others. Every individual member had to study, in the course of his duties, every problem under consideration. A specialist in medical work not only studied the physical but the economic and agricultural conditions of the people and vice vcrsa the economist and agricul- turist studied health conditions. The study does not represent many piles of diverse building materials, scattered here and there about the surface of the ground, but rather a complete and stately build- ing, tested, measured and built under the joint supervision of an integrated corp of specialists from the humble foundations to the roofing slate. Another characteristic of the study is that it is developed not only to serve practical ends but also the scientific interests which are the seed-beds of later practical ends. The information gathered and presented here was selected, gathered, arranged and analyzed according to the best scientific methods known to the members of the Commission. Every particular problem was not only developed according to the discretion of the Commission but according to the best advice which could be secured from a large number of scientific men in Bangkok and elsewhere about the country. Further, this work does not represent the report of a Com- mission based upon the findings and the experience of others. Every bit of information or analysis presented in this report is the pro- duct of the physical and mental labor of the members of the Commission itself, from the highest official to the lowest assistant. This study, while it deals with the agricultural crisis as a factor affecting the life of the people and with the needs for agricultural development, is not primarily a study of thc agricul- tural crisis. The study is based upon a fairly normal income year, before the slump in prices made itself felt all ovor Siam. It includes returns for the crop grown during the year B.E. 2472 (January to April 1930) and the expenditure approximately for the year B. E. 2473 (April 1930 to April 1931). Such a choice of time was dictated by several considerations. The work on this study started in December, 1930, before the crops grown in 1930 were gathered and sold. In order to cover the period of a full year, it was necessary to consider the income as based on the crops gathered and sold in the fall of 1929 and the spring of 1930. Further, the average farmer bases his expenses and plans of any particular year upon the cash he has received for the earlier crop. If the earlier crop was good, he is out of debt and has some money to spare, he feels opti- mistic and prepares for a good crop, and incurs labor bills and expeuses in the light of this optimism aud customary behavior. Consequently, the greatest balance is always found between the results of the crop sold and thc expenses for the crop-season following. Soon after the Work began the effect of the slump in pricea was felt. However, the Commission decided to study the conditions in a fairly normal year in Siam, without relation to the slump, in order to secure a picture of typical conditions. The results can be used later to determine the effect of the slump upou economic condi- tions aud to detcrmine when the agricultural situation has returned to normalcy. It was also dccided at the beginning of the work to apply the results to the same year for all parts of Siam, iu spite of the fact that the work as carried on over parts of two definite economic years. In the mai this had been done. In spite of these inteations, it was inevitable that the psycho- logy of the farming people would bias the latcr results toward the results of the more recent year. As thc work proceeded, it became more and more difficult to separate the thinking of the farmer for the year B. E. 24?2 from the year B. E. 2473. However, the Commission held steadfastly to its purpose, and in spite of some bias in the later results, in the main the data apply to the crop year B. E. 2472 and the expenditure year for the crop planted the beginning of B. E. 2473. (Crop sales of the late winter of 1929 and the early spring of 1930 and expenditures for the fiscal year of 1930.) The field work was completed by the first of july 1931. This study, while it is interested in the economic crssis is directed primarily towards a long time pogmam. The people in Siam have been growing rice for many hundreds of years. There have been good times and bad times, as iu all business endeayour. The aim of this Commission is to deal with a permauent situation. Iu- cidentally the suggestions also deal with tcmporary situations such as the present slump. It is kuown, further, from the uumerous failures of grandiose scheme to treat the symptoms of economic crises, rather than their underlying causes, that major endeavours for economic im- provement, based upon a long time scheme for permanent improvemeut, are the only ones that have achieved material success. The treatment of economic crises, if prescnt economic technique were rcally capable of such, would be a wonderful thing. However, the present develop- ment of the sober economic knowledge of the world, in spite of many grandiose price-fixing scheme to the contrary, seems to indicate that a present e-conomic crisis, unfortunate though it is, must be borne, though unwillingly. However, if from it, a nation or an individual can learn a lesson, something which will help to defer or alleviste inevitable crises which may be predicted for the future, that nation or that individual has made a forward step. A last characteristic of this study is that it is not limited to purely economic phenomena, as these are classified by the different students of economics. On the other hand, this study is an economic study, because all factors are considered in the light of their influence upon the economic and social development of the Kingdom of Siam. One of the classical factors in production is labor----the human factor. One of the influences affecting the efficiency of labor is the health of the laborer, his diet, his moral conditions, his opportunities. Further the relationships between population and economic resources are some of the most important long-time factors affecting the economic pro- ductivity and the national well-bcing of a people. If considerations of crime in any particular district are such that a peasant must keep his cattle at home, rather than send them to graze in the swamp or the jungle a few kilometres from home, the effieiency of the cattle and the economic productivity of that particular farm is reduced. The same applies to places where the conditions of crime are such that each family must establish its particular crop-watching cottage during the harvesting season. The efficiency of the economic unit is impaired. The study will try also to show the relationship of the economic factors to some of these other conditions. HOW THE STUDY WAS MADE. The study can only be understood in the light of the conditions under which it was made. A group of specialists representing four ministries were called together under the official sanction of His Majesty's Government. The character of the interests of the specialists called was determined by the leader of the study. This group met together at the Ministry of Commerce and Communications during a period of more than a month, and discussed the problems, the construction of schedules, the type and size of samples necesaary for analysis. This group of offcials with the Ministries and other specialists, constructed the schedules which went into the field-work of the survey. schedules were made with the advice of the whole groul. The schedules were taken into the field. Those items or details which were omitted or wich did not apply were corrected at the end of the work in the first village, and all additional informatiom was then secured by a second trip to the first village. Constant attentiou was paid to the organization of the schedules order to secure all the information pertinent to the study and with no useless information. A second factor in the study was the rigidity of standardiza- tion which was rcquired from all workers and the constant inspection which was used to keep this standardizatiou. very piecc of work was checked and inspected by at least two persons, and most of the time, three before the persons giving the information left the blace 0f meetim This was Come in oreler that mistakes arising out 0f different iuterpmetations of te same question, out of the new comditions which were arising constantly, miight bc eliminated. amy study such as this, where a unmber of persons arc engaged at the same type of work, the data are often made less valuable because of differtences in interprrtations. From thc beginning to the end of this study, this was guarded against very carefully. The method of hinportance was the approach. Two typos of abbroach were possible----the one from above and the one from the same level as from friond to frieud. In all Western count- cemsus data aro gathed from abovo, and those rcfusing to give Cormation cau be reqmired by law to fill out the schedules, even though the law may never be enforced. In this study the results were obtaimed only in two ways, by the use of prestige and by the use, of friendship. The average Siamese country person, and those in the cities as well) has two major public values to which he is accustomed by long training and great devotion to pay respect. These are the Goverment and the Church. This study was carried out in every way under the auspices of the local goverment officials (the Tesa, the Governor, the Nai Amphur, the kamnau and the pu-yai Ban) - and under the anspices of the Priests or Monks of the Buddhist Church. The locus of work was generally the Wat or Temple and the Monks were always about giving religious prestige to the study. In addition to goverumental and religious prestige, the approach to the peasants was that of friend to friend. The study was explained to them, they were made comfortable, and they were first of all <1given something before they were asked to give.>1 They were given physical examinations, free medical treatment and free medicines for all ailments beforc they were asked to cooperate in giving the economic informatiou. There were a number of governmental and local physicians always with the party and these even went to the extent of performing a number of minor operations for the relief of the suffiering in order to show the people that the survey party came among them as friends. Following taking the family schedules of income and expen- ditures, the different members of the Commission went among the villagers with the local officials and secured information relative to more general village topics by using thc same tact and common sense as was applied to the gathering of the earlier information. The physicians went to the houses of the villagers to make physical examinations of each individual member of the families. At no place were the people required to travel more than 15 or 20 minutes from their homes in order to give the information. The people were not handicapped in their work by being forced to wait nor by uunecessary "red tape ". Iu order to go to the people the study was conducted in the month, the northeast, the east, and the south before the rainy season and in the ceuter during the rainy season. Seldom has a study such as this beeu carried out under more ideal psychological conditions than surrounded this study. Hence, it is the belief of the Commission that seldom has a study come nearer to securiug complete accuracy of results from the standpoint of that general accuracy which make generalizations valid. It took an average of two hours working time for an official or an assistant to secure the economic information for the family budget schedule and approximately 30 minutes for securing the other data and for the complete physical examination of the head of the household. In the same careful manner, the tabulations and analyses have been carried on. The aims at all times have been accuracy and integrated analysis. From time to time the Commission met persons who did not think it was possible to secure such information. These were always invited to carefully inspect thc work and in no case did a visitor, who came as a sceptic, remain in a sceptic after such in- spection. Thus the members of the Commission, after these precau- tions, and after applying all the normal statistical tests of validity of data, such as the curves of distribution, the standard and other errors of variation and the tests of common sense, are led to the conclusion that the data are sound, and that they furnish the basis for reliable judgments upon the economic condition of the Siamese people. SAMPLING. It was determined at the start that there were four major economic and cultural areas in Siam----the North, the Northeast, the South and the Center. It was dctermined to place the major em- phasis of the study upon the districts in proportion to two factors---- the distribution of population and the economic development of the people. Accordingly it was decided that 12 villages were necessary to sample the North, 8 the Northeast. 8 the South and 12 the Center. This gave a total of 40 villages. The number of families to be studied in each group was de- termined on thc basis of experience and of statistical theory. It has been determiued by statisticians that even a variant group, such as university students, if they approach one of the usual curves of distribution, can be sampled successfully by purely random methoda if approximately 35 cases are secured. Economic studies of family budgets made in other countries show that groups of fifty chosen at random yield a norm which does not vary appreciably no matter how greatly the sample may be enlarged. Iu this particular study the range of income was used as thc index of representativeness of the sample. When it was found that the range did not change after 40 families had been selected, thc Commission agreed to limit the study in each village to 50 families. The representativeness of each village was tested by the curve of distribution of income and in every case it was found to approximate closely to the curve biassed toward the lower range, which has been established as a eonstant mode of distribution in most economic data. 1u order to secure further guarantee of represeutativeness, the families were chosen not by pure random sampling but by taking every house, or every other house, or every house at giveu intervals, where the number of the families in the village was more than 50. The selection of representative provinces was made by the Commission itself under the guidance and advice of the different Ministries. The selection of the representative districts and com- munes and villages was made by the local officials, since they wcre best acquainted with the local conditions. The results gave a slight bias toward Amphur Muang (The Town District) which, on the whole, is more prosperous than the other Amphur groups. This was compensated for by requiring that nearly all of the villages be takcn <1at least>1 5 kilometres from the administrative center and by the selection of compensating provinces, some of which were less prosperous than normal. To anyone Who has studied conditions in the Oriental peasant communities, where 5 kms. travel into the country districts generally givcs a similarity of conditions, in an economic sense, that a hundred kms. will give, it is evident that the precautions taken in this study guarantee accuracy of data from the standpoint of sampling. Hereafter, we will not repeat the names of the villages but refer to their respective Province names because there are thousands of villages in Siam. many of the same name but the Siamese reader will instantly recognize the Province. 12 THE VALIDITY OF THE INFORMATION. As The Commission has already said, The utmost of precau- Tions have been taken to insure that the information in every line of work was reliable. This applies equally well to the economic infor- mation, The data from physical examinations and the classifications of causes of death, the village information and the geueral information. Although the time allotted to This study has been only about a year, yet it has takeu the work of many persons. Most of the time, from 15 to 18 persons were working iu the field and from 8 to 12 in the tabulation department. Factually The study represents from 20 to 25 years work for a single individual. The problems of errors of interpretation aud variations among individuals has been handled by the method of centralization. The working force was never divided into more tban two groups, The field force and The tabulation force. AT The close of the field-work The force was divided into the tabulation force and the analytical force. All scales and mcasuring instruments including stethoscopes were carried with the party. They were constantly tested for reliability. All daTa in any science is only an approximation. Even the estimates of stress in engineering work are increased 5 or 6 times to take care of variation. In the secial sciences greater precautions have to be taken. IT is the judgment of the Commission that these precautions have been taken and that the data and information presented here are sufficiently reliable for the basis of the generalizations drawn from them. FORECAST OF THE ANALYSIS. The analysis commences with the economic data. Before this is presented, a general summary of some characteristics of the fami- lies is given. After this summary, the procedure is to give a general analysis of cash incomes and expenditures. Following is a summary of farm costs, of the incidence of direct taxation, and of business profits and iuvestments. Then an analysis of wealth and economic progress of the individual families is given, followed by an inter- pretation of living' expenses. Chapter VI1 makes some computations of the nation come of Siam for the year B.E. 2472 (April ]929- March l930). The remaining chapters summarize agricultural prac- tices, internal maketing of agricultural products, credit conditions, health, diet, and regional problems. The last chapter is a national programe for economie aud social development, based upon the data and aualysis in the preliminary chapters. Since the Industrial Revolutiou of the 19th century, and the apid spread of Westeru culture iuto the Orient, Siam has been faced with two problerus----that of aeconmodati itself to Westcrn culture and that of maintaining its national intcgrity. The second problem has been solved, at least for the bresent, by the abolition of extra-territoriality and the general recognition by the Western powers that Siam is worthy of a dignified place in thc League of Nations. Accommodation to Western culture logically falls into two eroblems, a general accomuiodation in communication and living condi- tions and an economic accommodation. Siam has already achieved the first part of this dcvelopmeut so that the couutry is already ahead of most of the Orient in the necesary adjustments to world condi- tions. Thc logical problem at the present is that of economic accommodation----which is the agricultural development of the King- dom of Siam. Thc above stateLnents ahould not be taken to mean that all of Western culture is good for Siam. Every civilization has its own national culture which is peculiar to itself and which it dare not destroy unless it wishes to aestroy itself. In all lines of accommoda- tion to the present so-called Westernization of world culture, Siam has shown that this country understands the problem of estimating what is valuable and what is not valuable in Western culture. Iu like manner, the same discretion concerning the modification of agricultural practices should be used. THE FAMlLIES AND THEIR AGRICULTURE. This ehaptler gives a genleral introduction to the families studied, thcir land teuure, tbe ricc production, thle fragmentation of the laneleol proplerty, and thle animals usled in tillage or for consump- tiou. Siamese agriculture consists of people, land, rice, buffaloes or bullocks and water. In this chapter the people, thcir land relations, their ricle and their animals are given a short introduction. The people are groupcd, as a rulle, into units which may bc described under scveral headings. Thc first of thcse is the villagc along a strcam or a river bank; the second is the village scattered among fruit farms which contain the homesteads and with rice lands beyond ; the third is the grouped village of pcoplc who farm the surrounding ricc fields; the last and least prevalent is the isolated farm 'The village along a waterway is most prevalent. The water- way furnishes the water for the rice growing. It is also the source of water for consumption and oftentimes the chief agency for com- munication and transportation. The fields lic beyond thc houses, to the rear or on both sides if the village lies on both sides of the water-way. Thc open fields separate the village from other villages on one or two sides, but the next village on the ends is along thc same waterway. So the village consists of a number of houses along a waterway. From placle to place it is broken into units adininistratively. Unlless one kncw beforehand, it would be hard to tell where one villagc lcft off-and the other began. The village scattered among fruit farms of several rai of land is also very prevalent. Iu places of purle fruit culture, thc arrange- ment is not dissimilar to thc isolated farms in the United States of 16 America except that the distance from housle to house is much less. Further, sincle much of the territory given to a pure fruit culture is irrigated, there is a tendency for the village to congregate about the waterways as the first type described. Iu the non-irrigated sections, the fruit farms form a large homestead center, sometimes one or two kilometres from one side to the other, surrounded by vacant fields giveu to rice culture in the raiuy season. In some sections there is a type of aggregated village of houses in close leontaet surrounded by areas of rice fields. These villages with their groves of trees form little forests in a great rice plain. They are close to each other in the riches soils and fartber away in the soils of less fertility. However, each little forest of houses and trees does not constitute a village administratively. On the contrary, it may be a half dozen, derending on tbe number of families and their relationships with each other. Each village head- man is given all the families that he may manage successfully and that are friendly with each other. The only other requisite seems to be that all thc people under onc headman must be living close together and contiguously. The village headmen are elected by the people each five years. Villages include from ten to eighty families. A few are smaller aud a few are larger, but these are very exceptional. Each ten to twenty villagc headmen elect a Kainnan who becomes a commune headman. Above thc commune headmen are the Nai Ampurs, appointed by the Central Government. The fourth form of social orgauization is the pure isolated farm, such as appears along the klongs iu the Rangsit section. Here each farmer lives on his farm. However, administrative villages arc formed of numbers of the houses so that the political organization is POPULATION. are iven in Tables II A through I D at the end of the chapter. Households averaged between five and six persons. Most of them were blood relatives or children-in-law. Very few othcrs 17 lived in the homes. They were nearly all of the Tai race except in the south, where some Siamo-Malays werc included in the study. Those not of Tai blood other than the Malays were nearly all of Chinese origin. A third could read and write in the center and the south and about a seventh in the north and northeast. Every 100 families liad the following numbers Of childrcn away frorn homc for the various districta :---- District Children permanently rcsiding away from home for each 100 families Center ... .., 76 North ... ... 47 South ... ... 64 Northeast ... ... 54 The children permanently residing away from home had gen- erally found life careers for themselves. A feW were in the village temples in training for the Buddhist priesthood. Thc children were nearly all to be found in the same village or in neighbouring villages. They nearlyrsways were following the occupation of their parents---- agriculture. A much higher proportion of the children who had left home could rcad and write compared With all the persons stillat home. This is the result of the educational facilities in the shape of country schools to be found in nearly every village. More boys had left home than girls. This is just opposite to thc condition found in an urban country. All countries of the Western world show thc opposite result as far as the migration statistics have been studied. Girls there leave the country homcs in greater numbers. LAND AND TENURE In this study all classes of people were included bccause in an undiffierentiated society it is impossible to tell who is a farmer and who is not. Except in the central plains, wherc the diffrerentia- tion has procecded a littlc more than in the other districts, it may be said that every one farms a little and everyone docs a little of something else. Even this applies largely to Central Siam. So it was insisted that all persons residing in 50 families living in typical villages should be included in the study. Aa explained in Chapter I the families were ricked by systemtie random sanmling In the cenral rlains, 36 out of each hundred owned no land : in the north 27 per cent were landless; in tbe south 14 rer cent and in the northeast 18 per cent. The average i owned for all families was 28 rai in the center compared with 10 rai in the north 8 rai in the south and 6 rai in the east. These averages do not eliminate the landless families. They are the average amounts of land owned for the whole village. Average amouuts for those who do own may be determiued by eliminating the landless from eacb village. the largest single farm owned in the ceutmal hlain was 302 rai; in the uorth, 1027 rai; iu the soutb 97 rai ; and in the northeast, 38 rai. All free lands being farmed under sqnatters' rights were classified as owned lands. Some land was rented aud some was leased to others. The net amounts of land cultivated per family per village for families in the central plaiLi was 24 rai ; for the north, l0 rai; for the south, 6 rai ; for the northeast, 7 rai. All computations for each village are based on 50, the total number of families studied. The landless families were merchants, shorkeerers and laborers. Some were well-to-do and some were roor. On the average they were just about the same as the land owners in wealth. With two lexeertions the landlords were Siaujese. In Southlerm Siam the Siam rlent from the Siam-Malay. In the central districts of the country the land has passed to soiue extent into the hamds of Chinese and others. However thle situation is not serious. the central districts particularly at Dhanyaburi where 84 per cent were tlenants. Northern and nortneaspern Siam out their lamds general- ly for a share of the rroduct. The tenaut furnishles the work animals and gives half of the eror to the landlord. The landlord pays the taxes. In southern Siam out of 69 tenauts 52 paid cash. In central Siam out of 173 tenants 133 paid cash. In central Siam thc landlord was aometimes responsible for thc taxes and in others the tenant. If 19 the landlord raid the taxes, the rent was generally that much higher. The chief tenant problem is in Dhanyaburi and the eastern irrigation district. Hcrc nearly all of the families are tenants. Re- lationships betwecn some of the landlorda and tenants were not particularly good. The landlords have not built dwcllings on their farms as a rule. Tenure contracts are generally for one year. Con- slequlently neither thc landlord, who oftentimes lives in Bangkok, nor plle tenant will improve the farms or the homesteads. One of the chief problems of land utilization is the excessive fragmentation which exists, particularly in northern, southern and northeastern Siam. Many pieces as small as a quarter of a rai of land exist. Some of these pieces are widely separated, not only from each other but from the house of the operator. Eventually this will become so uneconomic that the cultivators will be handicapped. At the prcsent time it has already reached that stage in many of the districts of Siam. An agricultural policy for the consolidation of holdings and the prcvcntion of fragmentation is needed at thc present time. RICE PRODUCTION. Most of the farmers measure ricc in baskets called "tang". These tang vary in size from village to village but they are approxi- mately the same size within a village. Data on the average amount of rice produced per family are presented. For each district, typical baskets were measured with a standard litre instrument. The rice production rer family varies from 2,600 litres of radi iu the south to 6,500 in thle north and 8,250 in the central districts. This is rice production aftcr the share raid as rent had bceu subtracted and before rent paid by tcnants had been added. In the south and in the north- east less than 20 per cent of the rice is sold and that is nearly always to neighbors. In the north 40 rer cent was sold. Some of this is sold to neighbors and the rest is shirred to Bangkok. The residents in the provincial towns in the north as a rule owu a share in a farm sufficient rice for the towns. In the central districts three-fifths of the rice was sold in spite of the fact that therc was considerable holding for higher prices. Rice held for speculative purposes waS conaidered as sold rice. 20 ANIMALS. Animals on Siamese farms consist of wapler-buffaloles, bullocks. pigs and fowls. The central Siamese farmers depend principally upon buffaloes for farm power. They average about two per family. Not all families own farms or buffaloes. They do not raise or sell buffaloes to any great expent preferring to buy them for culti vation and selling only the old ones. Northern Siam uses both buffalo and bullock. The buffaloes are for the rice fields and the bullocks for hauling. To some extent the use of animals there is very uneconomic. With some precaution the buffalo could be made to suffice for boph hauling and farming. In many districts of central Siam this is done. Southern Siam has more bullocks. One of the reason is that these animals are fed for the market. Another is that the bullock is a favorite animal for entertainment, viz. in their bull fighting. Farms in the south are small and cultivation is rather crude. In some dis- tricts they do not plow at all. Northeastern Siam raises animals to sell in phe central plains so the average farm has a larger number than in the other sections. In most communities about every other family has a pig. They are not usually a high gradle of stock. The Chines purchase and slaughter them for the market place. Two things are surprising in regard to the fowl industry. The first is the small number to be found on the average farm. One is almost sure that there is more room for chickens and ducks. The second interesting fact is that so few of them are consumed. To find a family which consumes three heads of fowl and two dozen eggs a year one has to search a long time. It is almosp unnecessary to add that proper breeding for the improvement of this poultry industry would improve the appearance and yields of most varieties. The average Westerner is surprised in all of the Orient by the lack of attention given to improved poultry and to the small consumption of poultry and eggs. CHAPTER III. CASH INCOMES AND EXPENDITURES. There are many types of studies of family budgets and of the economic conditions of families. This method of study was started by a group of investigators in Europe during the 16th. and 17th. centuries under the name of " Political Arithmetic." In 1850 the movement Was taken over by the International Institute of Statistics following the inspired work of Frederic Le Play and his school of thought during the first half of the 19th. century. Ontstanding workers were Ed. Ducpetiaux in Belginm, F. Engel in Germany and Carrol D. Wright in the U. S. A. Prominent thinkers who arrlied the results to agricultural conditions include numerous Russians work- ing through the Zemstvo offices, Andrew Boss in the U. S. A. and Emil Laur in Switzerland. Today there are thousands of studies in the Western World and a few in Asia. All of these studies are not of the same nature. Some are clasaified as " family budgetary " studies, others as " farm manage- ment " studies, others as " cost of living " studies and still others under various titles. The methodology varies according to the nature of the investigation and the personal preference Of the investigator. This present study is aimed at one or two major problems, such as to find the <1cash income>1 of the country people of Siam, the <1sources of income>1 and the <1distribution cash expenditure.>1 It aims also to find <1the factors influencing the size of the cash ~ncome.>1 Further it seeks to find <1the general nature of income in goods of>1 <1nature or of kind.>1 It is not a study of cost of living nor a study of farm management. Consequently this study has certain differences from many other tyres which might have been carried on during the investigation. 46 TERMS AND METHODS. In pursuance of these objectives, certain terms and methods have been used which should be understood by the reader. The term <1cash i?ncome>1 is used to mean money on its equivalent. Alaborer who was paid 25 tang of padi in lieu of wages, was considered to have received the value of that in money. A peasant who borrowed padi that much money and to be pa yin; an interest rates in propertion to the present market value of the padi. Income in natural goods cunsumed at home was not considered evalued. Share reut paid was not considered a cash expenditure. If a peasant owned five rais and rented it out for half of the Padi and then consumed the rental share at his house, it was uot considered cash. All money received was accounted for as spent. Thus a peasant who received 100 Baht and had srent only 80 for farming and living expenses was credited with spending 20 for " savinga and or spends it otherwise. Accordingly, all receipts not spent were credited as " investment." On the other hand, all expenditures had to be counted also. Thus one family spent 50 Baht more than the cash receipts fur the year. That family ended with a deficit. The deficit was explained according to the reason for the greater exrenditure and the source of the extra funds. Another family spent 50 Baht less than income. The 50 Baht was credited as an investment As a result of this accounting system, all immediate expendi- tures Plus investment and savings never equal the cash income for a community. But that does not mean that the community is generally spending more than the yearly income. On the other hand they ty in relation to cash income for the year can be determined only by 47 the following formula :---- <1Do cash expenditures minus investments equal cash income?>1 Illustrations of this are as follows. In the central section cash expenditnres for the year were 363 Baht, investments 61 Baht and incomes 279 Baht. Applying the fomnula :---- " Do cash expenditures minus investments equal cash incomes ? " we find : 363 Baht minus 61 Baht eduals 302 Baht which is greater than the average cash income of 279 Baht by 23 Baht. This means that on account of the low prices for radi, there was a state of low income in the central division for the year B. E. 2473. Some farmers saved money and others lost but the losses were greater than the savings by an average of 23 Baht. In the North, Northeast and South the following results were found :---- North 191 Baht minus 43 Baht equals 148 Baht which is 28 Baht less than the income of 176 Baht. This means that the northern farmer had expenaes 28 Baht on the average less in B. E. 2473 than the income from the sales the last of B. E. 2472 plus miscellaueous income during B. E. 2473. South 135 Baht minus 26 Baht equals 109 Baht which is 17 Baht leas than the average income of 126 Baht. Northeast 92 Baht minus 14 Baht equals 78 Baht which is 5 Baht less than the average income of 83 Baht. In other words, the depression hit the central sections more in 2473 than the other sections simply because the central districts depend more upon sales of rice and many were caught by the decline in priees before they sold their crop. The other sections did not feel the depression as much because their agriculture is self-sufficing. Further, the other sections felt the depreasion somewhat later. they started to feel the effects of depression a few months later than in the central diviaions. Some of the accounting princirles used are more or less arbitrary. It is very difficult to make all of human life perfectly logical. All we could hope to do was to be consistent in all cases. This we have done. Incomes for the merchant classes are net incomes. The costs of stocks and gross expenses of business were subtracted before the net incomes were used as incomes of the people. Farm incomes are gross incomes. Their costs of business in money were negligible, other than taxes, interest, and reinvestments in their business, so the data are closely comparable. <1Cash Income and Its Sources.>1 Tables III A through III T at the end of this chapter give the important data summarizing these results for the various districts. Here we summarize the principal results and rresent the conclusions. The incomes varied as follows :---- but since the depression hit central Siam earlier We estimate the normal cash receiPts per family for central Siam before the depres- sion year at 330 Baht. The chief difference in source of income in the Center was that it was more from crops and less from animals, fish and miscel- laneous sources. The lower the cash income the more diversified are the sources from which it comes. The income from croPs averaged :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1income.>1 In the central sections, more of the cash income was from rice but in the other sections it came more from other cross. <1However>1 <1rice production still played an important part where at all possible.>1 49 Animal products brought average amounts as follows :--- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1income.>1 The chief conclusion is that the animal industry other than for work animals----buffaloes and bullocks---is practically undeveloped in Siam. Its principal fields of development, other than for home use, will be the non-rice-growing areas, northern, southern, and northeastern Siam. Cash income from fish sales averaged :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1income.>1 The less rice is grown, the more in general, is the attention paid to the fishing industry. Miscellaneous cash returns were as follows :--- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1imcome.>1 The chief sources of miscellaneous returns in the Center are wages and rentals in cash from farms. In the other sections, home industries, and jungle products gather more significance than in the Center. 50 Farm costs (labor, machinery, animals etc.) average :--- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expenditures.>1 In other words, farm costs rise the same as income so that the central farmer has more but has to spend more. Taxation (direct only) averaged for the districts :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expenditures.>1 The central farmer paid higher taxes and a higher proportion of all cxpenditures for taxes. Further these are based upon ex- penditures that are higher in the Center than in the other sections. Average interest costs for the districts were as follows :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expenditures.>1 The central farmer is intimately acquainted with the money- lender as well as with the tax-collector. Savings and investment for the districts were :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expenditures.>1 51 The data for the Center were unusually low because the depression had already been felt there as discussed above. The other farmers with smaller incomes came nearer to the central districts in savings, however, than they did in incomes. Cash spent for food, in addition to that furnished by the farm and caught free (direct appropriation) averaged :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expend itures.>1 The central farmer did not raise his living at home as much as in the other districts. The other sections should learn to raise more of their food at home or to secure higher cash incomes. The clothing expense averaged :--- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expend itures.>1 In the outlying districts, most of the clothing is woven at home This is one of the most interesting of Siam's domestic industries and deserves to be promoted and preserved. Household expenses averaged :---- <1Amount Per cent of all>1 <1expenditure.>1 Thus expenses for the household approximate closely to size of incomes the same as do the other expenses. All other expenses averaged :--- count Per cent of all <1expenditures.>1 The central farmer has inore and he spends more. These data following are used as the basis for the suggestions given in tlie other chaptcrs. 1t is evident that they have real value to the person who wishes to understand the nature of this country and its problems. Further, the administrative ofiicial and the Revenue Department can find much to study here. Consequently, the data are presented in some detail. No such data exist for Siam, and with a few minor exceptions, for any of Asia. Sian has three districts near the state of self-sufficient agri- culture and one commercialized district, the Center. In the self- sufficing districts, there is a commercialized agriculture in many spots, near the cities, markets and places of communication. The major problem of the self-sufficing districts is more development of sources for cash incomes. The major problem of the commer- cialized districts is diversified farming, with more home production of food and other items of consumption. The setf-sufficient farmer in Sian can make more money without raising his cost of living and the commercialized farmner can lower his cost of living-raise more <1food etc. at homc, without lowcring his ricc production and cash>1 <1income.>1 1f Siam wants a real concrete objective for a national agricultural program, this should be it. The failure to realize this policy is shown by the close correlation between income and basic living expenditures. The result of this failure is the rapid decline of public revenue from taxes in the depression periods. The long time amelioration of the results of depressions in a commercialized agricultural Siam can be achieved largely by adopting and carrying out the above policy as an agricul- tural economic objective. CHAPTER IV. FARM COSTS, TAXATION, GAIN AND INVESTMENT Since the development of commercialized agriculture in the Western world, the term "cost of production of agricultural products " has come into common usage. In this chapter some of the items of <1farm costs>1 are considered. These are not to be considered " costs of production" in the economic usage of the term. " Cost of produc- tion " has many usages and an involved economic background which cannot be dealt with fully here. Cost of production includes many phases of agriculture. This present analysis is limited to a few only. Further, there is a tendency away from the use of the concept in many western lands simply because it is now becoming known gene-- rally that "cost of production" is as much a result in agriculture as it is cause. For instance, it is now generally known that market prices do determine " cost of production" at times as well as cost of produc- tion determines market prices at others. Agriculture is an industry of fixed and variable factors in production. To a considerable extent land in cultivation is more of a fixed factor than some other items entering into economic production. The result is that changes in average market prices over a term of years may see more or less the same amount of land used in production but greater or lesser econo- mic rentals imputed to each unit of land. The same analysis applies to the economic value imputed to the labor of the peasant and his family. They must be busy ; they cannot as easily move into other industries, particularly in a country like Siam, as factory laborers can be thrown out of employment and be pushed gradually into other industries. 74 There was one general standard of utilization of land, labor and capital in Siamese agriculture during the years of higher price for padi. If the average prico continues lower, there may be another. It may be that more rice will have to be produced with the same land and labor in order to keep up incomes in an era of lower returns per unit of rice produced. Under any circumstances, the problem is more complicated than that of holding rice from the market hoping for a return of the price to higher levels. DATA GN FARM COSTS OR EXPENDITURES. In Tables IV A through IV D following the end of this chapter, some data are given concerning expenditures which go into the costs of the farm business. These give a picture of what is purchased for agricultural production under the present customs of market adjustment in Siam. These items are for expenditures for crops (feed for animals), seed, labor, carts and implements, animals and modicinc for animals, boats and fishing cquipment, building materials and for water and irrigation. Land tax is also a cost which bears on production but we do not summarize the data here. The facts about taxation are analysed in Tables IV E through IV H. The farmer of the central plains spent an average of 62 Baht a year for these items of farm cost. The northern farmer spent an average of 22 Baht ; the southern farmer spent 7 Baht ; and the northeastern farmer spent 8 Baht. Thus <1it may be seen that expenditures for>1 <1costs of agriculture approximate closely to cash receipts.>1 In the Tables of the previous chapter on gencral distribution of expen- ditures, it was shown that the central farmer used 17 per cent of his expenditures for these items, the northern farmer 12 per cent, the southern farmer 5 per cent and the northeastern farmer 9 per cent. The second conclusion is that <1agriculture in Siam is an>1 <1industry which combines labor and land in production to a mueh>1 <1greater extent than in other countries of greater commercialization>1 <1of agriculture.>1 Countries of greater commercialization of agriculture use a higher proportion of capital goods to land and labor than is used in the agriculture here. On the other hand, countries of less commercialization of agriculture often use a less proportion of capital goods than is used in Siam. In general however, the picture is somewhat biassed by the fact that Siam is a country of abundant resources and many of the capital goods bought for agriculture elsewhere can be appropriated directly from nature here more than in some other countries. Cat- tle feed, oftentimes purchased in other countries of single crop pro- duction, can be appropriated directly from the unused rice fields (during the dry season) and from the unappropriated or a common property such as the government lands, the banks of canals and the swamps. Further, in almost all districts, except the central plain, there is an abundance of nearby timber for the making of the agri- cultural instruments and for the building of homes and outbuildings. Even in the central plains the people are very adept in growing and using bamboo and other woods for use in the making of agricultural perquisites. Let the details of the distribution of the most important of these expenses be summarized before further consideration is given to results and conclusions. Hired labor called for the following average amounts of expenditures and proportions of all farm expen- ditures for the districts :-- Amount in Per cent of all Instruct Baht farm expenditures. The most general conclusion to be drawn from the above ; table is that commercializatian of agriculture in Siam, or the development of market production sees the application of greater quantities of labor to the entrepreneurial unit. 1n other words, the production of market rice is associated with the gathering together of more hired laborers under one management. The peoplc turn to more labor first of all, rather than to the use of more machines or labor saving devices. Since laborers have certain psychological fixed costs (they do not wish to have wages reduced from a Baht to fifty stang when rice falls from about one Baht per tang to about 50 stang per tang) this means that a depression has a more harsh effect on production following a crisis than might be the case if other goods were used more in market production. If buffalo := were used in place of the laborers, and the decline in rice prices forced down the market price of buffalo an equal amount, the farmer = could go on producing with his sarne profit,as far as this variable cost in agriculture is concerned. = It would seem as if the market producing farmers add more land and more labor but do not change the use of other capital goods in production as much. They do not use an improved plow, a better system of plowing or of seed selection or of manuring or a , more intensive use of animal labor. The use of capital goods and capital processes, if anything, becomes more extensive with the com- ' mercialization of agriculture. This conclusion may point to the way cf adjustment of agriculture to a new and lower price level, if the present crisis should mean such. More rice might be produced with less land and less labor but with the better utilization of improved agricultural processes. The reduced costs might enable profits under a lower price per unit of padi. The other important item in agricultural production as considered in this table of costs is animal power. The data must be considered in rolation to the fact that some of the outlying districts produce animals for sale whereas the animals in the central section are mostly for work. In the various districts the following average amounts and proportions of farm expenses were used for animals :- Per cent of all District Amount spent in farm expenditures Baht lassified here. These data, as indicated above, are biassed hy the fact that the outlying districts produce animals for sale and the central section buys animals for work to a greater extent. However, from careful observation in the field, it is believed that the above conclusions as to the relative utilization of capital goods in agriculture are valid. The market producing farmer, who is harmed the most by the depression, uses more land per unit of cultivation, uses fever animals, hires more laborers and uses the same technique of production less intensively. He uses the sarne inefficient plow, no better seed selection, no better methods for securing water, less transplanting, less weeding of the fields, and less fertilizer. The farmer in the self-sufficing districts transplants rice more often, manures his transplanting seed-bed and, since he transplants, uses less seed per rai of rice land. The com- mercialized farmer does not utilize a better distribution of labor throughout the year. The commercialized farmer diffiers from the - other by larger economic units, and less intensive agriculture, but too often it is inerely the same agriculture as in the self-sufficing districts, although gathered into larger units of management. The technical processes and the input of non-human, non-land production factors capital goods) is not increased. He may secure as much per rai of land but, if so, it is in spite of his methods of cultivation. It would seem that this type of agriculture may accoinodate best to a lower price level in the following manner. The farming should be made more intensive, but not be a return to the system of the self-sufficing agricultural type. It should use the present capital resources more intensively. It should find a more even distribution of labor throughout the year enabling more intensive production with the same input of family labor and of hired labor units and expense. Technical processes should be improved such as seed selection and manuring, not to mention plowing, so that the same or less money expense will produce more rice. Expensive machinery cannot be introduced at this time and probably is not needed. But the Krasetra plow, which costs only 10 Baht and is much more efficient than the ordinary plow, should be introduced. Seed selection by the individual farmer is not expensive. Selecting the best for seed 78 and improving the quality year by year can be done by the individual farmer. In countries of a more highly developed agriculture this is the universal practice. The use of all natural manure costs only the present unused time of the family. Costs of living can be reduced (the real cost of family labor) by growing more food stuffs at home without detracting from the agriculural production. By these and other processes the cost per unit of rice may be reduced and the farmer may have the same net income as before. TAXATION. From the previous chapter, it is seen that taxation (forms of direct taxation) amount to 7 per cent of all expenditures in the Center, 5 per cent in the North, 5 per cent in the South and 5 per cent in the Northeast. On the average, the families of the Center paid 27 Baht, those of the North 9 Baht, those of the South 7 Baht, and those of the Northeast 4 Baht. Land taxes were 73 per cent of all taxes in the Center, 42 per cent in the North, 37 per cent in the South and 13 per cent in the Northeast. Of the districts visited in the Northeast, only one had a land tax. Head taxes, as a proportion of all taxes, on the other hand, increase from 15 per cent in the Center to 85 per cent in the Northeast. If we consider the farming costs and the direct taxes as necessary business expenses, the taxes in the Center are 30 per cent of necessary business expenses, 29 per cent in the North, 49 per cent in the South and 34 per cent in the Northeast. Most of the taxation comes from the Center. A dis- ruption of commercial agriculture hence causes a heavy drain on government revenues. The country people are nearly all subject to taxation in one form or another. Steadiness of internal revenue might be promoted by a greater diversification of tax upon the non- farming population whether in the provinces or in the cities. In addition to these taxes upon agriculture, the export tax on padi sales also bears upon nearly all peasants through a diffierential between the world price for padi and the internal price. This amounts to almost 17 stang per picul. It reduces the price for rice sold from the producing population within the country to the consuining population within the country without adding to the governmental revcnue. Tho only rice adding to the governmental revcnue is the cxported part. Further the tax on animals slaughtered affects the farmer's revenue bv tending to reduce the price he might receive for his animals. A reduction in world prices may mean that some of the country people Will not be able to pay all these taxes at their present rates because taxes on agriculture become a part of the cost of production. 1f a crop is grown under the <1Fang Loi>1 system it must pay a tax. Business gains are reasured many ways. In most industries the expense of living of the operator is taken from his gain. However, this analysis is limited to a small share of business gain---that which is left after the farmer has paid taxes, paid his costs of living, paid his farming costs and necessary expenses. Further that part of the expenscs which adds to the value of the farms may be also considered a gain. An agricultural business is such a confu- sion of wages, rents from lands and profits from business that arguments can never be settled as to which is which. As a result, it has been decided to define gain rather arbitrarily. Others who differ can compute their own figures from the data given in thc various chapters. The process of calculating a figure called "business gain" as used here is as follows. The expenses for farming, taxes, interest, food, clothing, household purposes and othcr living are added together. From this is subtracted nine-tenths of the value of the animals carts and building materials purchased during the year. The re- mainder is subtracted from the cash income. The resultant figure may be callcd the net gain of agricultural capital during the year, at least from the standpoint of the families concerned. The nine-tenths of the value of the animals, carts and building materials purchased during the year was just a rough estimate based on the leugth of life of these materials. It was assumed that at least one,tenth of their value would deteriorate during the year. However, there are some other expenses which constitute a sort of a saving or invest- 80 ment, such as new cattle born on the farm. These could not be taken into consideration except by being liberal with the deterioration figure for animals, carts and building materials bought. Thc same applies to new boats. However, arbitrarily it was assumed that nine- tenths of the items listed above would account for most of these other savings or capital goods. By this method of computation, a " business gain " figure for ' the families in the districts is sccured. 1n the table which follows, the expensc for farming, taxes, interest, food, clothing, household and other living are added together and listed in the column " all expense ". The nine-tenths of the expense for animals, carts and building ' materials is called " reinvestment". The subtraction of the "reinvestment " from the " all expense" gives a " net expense". Comparing this with cash incomes,it is seen that the average family in the Center lost 1 Baht during the year (from latter half of 2472 to end of the first half of 2473). The northern family gained 39 Baht, the southern family 24 Baht and the northeastern family 11 Baht. Since this was an abnormal year in the central plain, the normal cash income was estimated to be 335 Baht. This would have given the central family an average gain of 58 Baht if the rice prices had not dropped before sales were made. COMPUTATION OF BUSINESS GAIN BY DISCRICTS District All ex- Rein- Net Expense Cash Gain The chief importance of the above calculations is that it shows that the Siamese Farmer is an " economic man " and can with the proper instruction develop into a much more successful commer- cialized farmer. It also shows that at present the gain per family is small and a few bad years will rapidly wipe out their spending capacity. <1One of the reasons why they have such difficulty in pay->1 81 <1ing taxes on a bad year is due to this low rate of gain. The gain>1 <1may be increased both by higher incomes and by greater thrift and>1 <1saving.>1 INVESTMENT Investment is different from gain. Some gain, some lose. Those who gain, save or invest. Those who lose borrow, fail to pay bills or deplete their savings. In the tables at the end of the chapter there are four (IV I through IV L) that summarize the distribution of investment expense. The tables simply prove one thing of out- standing importance----that the investment facilities of the average farmer are very limited. He can pay off debts, pay something on a new piece of land, save bullion orjewelry about the house or lend it out or improve his farm. Since lands are difficult to take care of in the ordinary village with its fragmentation of property, most stop buying land when they have enough for the working power of their families. Bullion is dangerous to keep about the houses. Invest- ment in jewelry is uneconomic and is not practised as much by Siamese agriculturist as by those in some other parts of Asia. It is an insignificant factor. Money lent out is not repaid on demand particularly in times of crisis when the borrowers are often worse off- than the lenders. The capital use in agriculture at present is limited by the expensiveness of most imported machinery and by the customs of the people. <1This all points to the need for savings or deposit>1 <1institutions,for education as to their use and for an agricultural>1 <1policy to improve the adaptation and use of more capital processes>1 <1in Siamese agriculture.>1 CHAPTER V. WEALTH AND ECONOMIC PROGRESS. This chapter presents a summary of the wealth accumulations by the Siamese country people. It is based upon an inventory taken at the village at the time of the study. The land was valued at current sales prices. The movable equipment and property was valued as carefully as possible. The most important items were the animals of their age and condition. Other property was worth very little. In most cases it was made by the countryman himself, except in the cases of the carts. The personal property was valued following the budgetary study, so it is fairly accurate. If a man were a money-lender or had a stock of goods, the value of money lent and the value of the stock of goods had already been ascertained very closely. His debts were already known. The only additional facts that were needed were the amounts of the inheritances. These lands or properties inherited were valued at the prices obtainable at the time of inheritance. Gifts and dowries were considered as inheritances----not property accumulated by the person and his family. PROPERTY AND DEBT. Tables V A through V D summarize the inventories of the , families and tell the values of the different types of property. The financial status of rural Siam for B. E. 2473 was approximately as follows :---- - 96 In general it can be seen that the Siamesc are well to do compared with the population of Asia generally. The ratio of debt to inventory will be considered surprisingly low by many. However, it is to be remembered that capital is not fluid in the oriental country districts. A smaller ratio of debt to inventory is to be found under such cases. Further, interest rates are so high and can compound so rapidly that it takes but a few seasons to throw the lands of many of the smaller cultivators, or the poorer ones, into the hands of the money-lender. Further, the country has no rural credit institutions. It also has been without any financial depression or crisis or crop failure for many years. As a result the people were relatively in an excellent economic condition at the time of the coming of the depression. RATES FOR PROPERTY ACCUMULATION. The estimated inventories minus the average amounts given to the persons furnish figures on accumulations during the operator's lifetime. By making the assumption that each man began to accumulate property from the age of 20 onward, the average additions to the national wealth each year by each peasant family may be estimated. The data for the districts and the whole country are as follows :---- Thus up to the crisis, the total wealth of the 1,828,000 coun- try families of Siam was 2,415,641,000 Baht and the amount had been increasing at the rate of 62,152,000 Baht a year. This figure of increase on the average per year should not be confused with the average "gain" of farming as given in Chapter IV. These are entirely different figures. One is based on one year; the other on many years. Further, the self-made gains include increases in land values which are the so-called unearned increments accruing to the culti vators. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS. The problem of agriculture at present is to get this figure of national rural wcalth back to the pre-slump level as quickly as pos- sible. Further, the percentage of yield per Baht of wealth should be improved. A part of this can be done by developing systems of agriculture in which the " technique " and the utensils used do more to aid the land and labor in productivity. This will mean a higher per cent of the national wealth will then be in movable productive equipment and property. If 200,000 of the 650,000 families in the rural parts of central Siam had small oil engines with attached water pumps of efficient sort, costing in units together about 150 Baht delivered to the farms, the national wealth would be increascd by 30,000,000 Baht, which is only 1.24 per cent. However, by the care- ful use of these pumps to supplement the distribution of rainfall and the lovel of water in the canals, these would probably add more to the national income than three times the same money in additional lands. The case for Siamesc agriculture is very hopeful. The trouble is that the people as a whole are not on their own possibilities for economic development. 108 It may be said also that these details are fairly accurate. Administrators interested in excise taxes visited with the party at the starting of the survey and questioned the possibility of securing data on certain items such as alcoholic drink or drugs. This only made the determination for accuracy greater. Physicians examined every head of household before the economic data were secured and if any evidence of drug addiction or alcoholic consumption were found it was known beforehand to the investigator securing the economic information. Any questionable cases were discussed with the local officials and neighbors as to accuracy of the reports and, in case of doubt, the man was interviewed again. If his physi- cal examination showed any of the usual marks of a drug addict, it was up to the man to show how much he used. The Commission, as a body, feels that these data are accurate. All local alcoholic dispen- saries, shops, drug concessions and country stores were visited in every village. Observations concerning the items sold and prices were made. Further, every village was searched for <1kratawm>1 - trees <1(Mitragyma Speciosa)>1 and local prices and consumption of the leaves were noted. In many cases the villager who could not afford opium chewed <1kratawn>1 leaves. However, drug addiction and alcoholic consumption were low in the villages. Drinking was mostly done on FGGD. Food expenditures in cash averaged 63 Baht in the Center, 44 in the North, 35 in the South, and 29 in the Northeast for each house- hold. The proportions of the food expenditures used for rice declined with the approach to the commercialized farming districts. The . w gec e more and more This correlation between commercialization of agriculture and the purchase of food, other than rice, appears more in the quantities consumed than in the numbers of the peoplc purchasing the important items. CLOTHING. The same relationship between commercialization and clothing purchases appears also. The clothing purchases in the Center 109 averaged 20 Baht per family, in the North 13 Baht per family in the South 12 Baht per family, and in the Northeast 7 Baht per family. On the whole there were no differences in the amount of clothing used or worn. In the outlying districts, home weawing is almost universal. In the inner sections clothing is bought. On the whole, many of the items of the home producing sections were more comely and artistic, and had more lasting qualities than similar clothing in the commercialized areas. This art may disappear with commercia- lization. It deserves to be maintained by the introduction of better methods and the encouragement of the people to continue home weaving. Many European countries, Switzerland for instance, are trying to revive the home produced clothing industry st this time. The purchased clothing is not as artistic, it is more expensive, it does not last as long and, further, the styles of garments tend to become less healthful considering the local environments. There is no reason, as far as time or money is concerned, that home production of clothing should not be general in all Siamese country districts. HOUSEHOLD EXPENDITURES. The tables give detailed averages of expenditures for fuel, light, insect protection, kitchen utensils, new houses or repairs and other expenses. In the Center the household items cost on an average of 25 Baht per family per year, in the North 15 Baht, in the South 14 Baht, and in the Northeast about 9. The most important items economically were the new houses or repairs, the fuel and the light. The general use of kerosene is increasing in all districts. Little fuel was bought, oxcept charcoal by the wealthier families. Matches are used almost universally. The torch industry (a combination of an absorbent plant with a combustible sap from a tree) is retreating before the inroads of kerosene lamps and electric ffashlights. Mosquito nets and screens are coming into use, but slowly. The general introduction of the use of these is almost necessary on account of the prevalence of malaria and infectious diseases carried by insects in the country. Among the masses of the people, even if a child is kept from mosquitoes and flies until weaning time, he is then constantly exposed. The general idea is 110 that a child of that age is sufficiently large to develop his own resistance to these parasite carriers. The almost universal prevalence of malaria and other infections, particularly yaws or framboesia, is made certain by this general inattention to protection against insects while sleeping. Another common defect of housing, from the health point of view, is the attention paid to smoke prevention. Cooking is done over the open fire in most cases. In spite of the fact that cooking is done out of doors during much of the dry season, it may be said that no country home is uncoated with smoke deposits if more than a year old. In spite of the minor attention paid to this matter; it is still believed that it is important. The peasants of the southern United States are in many ways almost identical in agricultural economy and in climatic surroundings with the northern and north- eastern sections of Siam. They also cook out doors in the dry season. But their houses are constructed about chimneys built of mud or stone. These chimneys rest on the ground and the house is built around them or the chimney forms one end of the house. These chimneys take the air from the houseand keep up a constant circula- tion. Further, they take up the smoke from the house since the cooking is done over a fireplace at the point where the chimney meets the floor. The peasants of the United States who follow this practice have a much less number of eye defects than those of Siam OTHER EXPENDITURES FOR LIVING. These items are health, tobacco, betel and areca, drugs, alcohol, weddings and marital customs religious rites and ceremonies travel of all kinds, gifts and charity, and incidental items. In the Center, the total of these items cost 82 Baht per family in the North 40 Baht per family, in the South 32 Baht per family, and in the Northeast 18 Baht per family. The health item includes the expenditures for births, deaths and all medical attention. Merit making for deceased relatives was classified under religion. But these " health" costs given here include cremation expenses. Health bore almost a constant relation in proportion to the other expenditures classified in this table although the actual amount spent per family declined from 9 Baht in the Center to less than 3 Baht in the Northeast. Tobacco and cigarettes consumed about 4 to 5 Baht per family per year, except in the Northeast, where most of the tobacco is produced at home. Betel and areca were used about the same in every section but the cash expenditures increased in the commercial farming districts because more of these items were purchased. The cost of drugs depended upon the number of families using these items. In the Center more of the families, particularly the trading and shopkeeping families, had expenditures for drugs. In the country districts out of the Center, very few families use drugs of any sort. Those who do use them very often take to <1bai kratawm>1 because of its cheapness and because, on the whole, the usage of this leaf is considered less harmful. Alcohol costs very little because steady users were not found very often. The drug and alcohol users of Siam, as in most other countries, are to be found principally in the cities and among the commercial and laboring (Proletariat) classes of the population. 1t was known from the start that these expenditures would be scrutinized carefully because of their relationships to public revenue and of the numerous attempts to control their consumption. Accordingly, the problems were studied with especial care and it is believed that the results are accurate. Wedding customs which cost a great deal of money are almost entirely located in the central regions or among the urban classes not included in the study. Religious rites cost 28 Baht per family in the Center, 11 in the North, 8 in the South, and 5 in the Northeast. However, the proportion that these bear to other living expenditures is almost the same for the three districts indicating almost identical aacrifices for the preservation of religious institutions, customs and spirit. Travel was not particularly expensive in any of the districts because most of the people have low rates of mobility. Local travel, other than where busses or motorboats have come in, is generally performed at little cost. 112 Other expenditures varied according to local customs and particular circumstances. CONCLUSIONS. Information such as presented here should serve as the basis for guidance of public administration of the laws concerning the welfare of social classes and concerning consumption and the cost of living. They should guide a part of the health work of a country. In addition, they furnish the basis for construction of national indices of purchasing power and of national well being. Indices of economic changes require not only prices but quantities consumed and the relation of the individual items to the total family budget. Finally, they furnish the basis of many scientific generalizations concerning consnmption habits. It is unfortunate that time for their further consideration is lacking. In general, however, a few conclusions may be suggested. First, it is evident that variations in the cost of living of country people in Siam are influenced most of all by the attitudes of the people towards home production. Districts which find their profits lessened by declines in prices can make adjustments within the area of home consumption. Individual farmers who wish to improve their farms, Second, the individual environment is also a factor. Placrs lacking wood must purchase fuel. Places lacking rice or fish must buy these or find substitutes. However, the attempt to find substitutes is almost undeveloped. Speaking from observation, there is no reason why the small rice territory in the Northeast should not be supplemented by wheat. The Indian who cannot have sufficient rice, lives on wheat. The same applies to the other sections of Asia. Further, the use of pulses other than string beans, for a protein food, is practically undeveloped in Siam. Poultry and egg consumption is very little. Third, the Siamese people are not suffering. They live well. On the other hand, there is a great deal that may be done to improve their living conditions. Agricultural extension Work as in other countries can bring about these changes. CHAPTER VlI. NATIONAL RURAL CASH INCOME. The previous data enable the computation of a national rural general value of such computations is that it gives a group picture of the problem of economic progress. For purposes of this computation, the same numbers of families and the average cash incomes as already computed for the different districts are used. The computation for B. E. 2473 is as follows :---- It may be estimated as in chapter V that the total wealth of the families in B. E. 2473 for the separate areas was as follows:---- To compute the returns in cash per unit of 100 Baht invested in wealth, the figures on gross cash income may bc applied to gross wealth. By such estimates, the following results are secured :---- Returns in Cash B. E. 2473 for Each 100 Baht of Wealth Invested in Agriculture. Cash receipts per unit of wealth are very small. The question may be raised as to whether wealth has been valued too highly. However, this is a current sales valuation and the estimates have been done very conservatively. The net conclusion is that the agricultural technique is so poor that too much investment of wealth is used per unit of cash returns. In other words Siam needs improved cultivation per unit methods of cultivation, processes of seed selection, manuring, water control, more efficient instruments and by many other improvements. Since only a small portion of the cash receipts may be called a " profit" the borrowing of money costs more than it yields. That is, borrowed money costs an average of 22 per cent. Since borrowed wealth already on hand, the borrowing of funds means that the yield of much more capital must be used to pay the interest. Borrowed money under present conditions of investment and interest rates does not pay for itself. If it were borrowed for improvements which would make all wealth more productive, the results would be different. Suppose a farmer made a net profit of 3 per cent on capital invested and borrowed a tenth more than he had. If he raised the return on all of his capital by 1 per cent as a result of borrowing a tenth he could afford to pay 14 per cent interest, the 4 per cent his extra capital yielded and the 1 per cent additional on each original 10 parts of his capital. But if he makes only 2 or 3 per cent and borrows a tenth at 22 per cent and this tenth yields also only 2 or 3 per cent, he must take the revenue from his other land and capital to pay the extra interest. That is the situation as it exists in Siam. Borrowing is for the same type of agriculture as is carried on by previously invested capital. The situation in Siamese agriculture to-day is the net result of a combination of a poor credit system and a poor agricultural technique combined. Tables VII A through VII F in the appendix to this chapter tell where the losses of the depression caused actual decreases of agricultural capital during the year B. E. 2473. Those groups which had greater average expenditures other than investment decreased agricultural capital. As shown by computations following, the losses caused a net reduction of the capital of B. E. 2472 in the lower four fifths of the agricultural population in the central plains. . Losses were negligible in the less commercialized districts. 132 However since the computation of investments does not include reinvestments in improving the farms, the situation is not as bad as is pictured. Further, some lost more and others less so many of these families did not sustain net losses or gains because they belonged to a class which reduced national agricultural capital in B. E. 2473 over B. E. 2472. Reinvestments in the farms Will however be offset by a reduced value to the farm property. CHAPTER VIII. AGRICULTURE. This chapter gives a concrete description and analysis of the methods and problems of technical agriculture for the areas studied. The analysis was made after careful study and observation of the methods not only in the 40 villages but in several hundreds of neighboring villages. <1NORTHERN SECTION. This section includes the Provinces of Chiengmai, Lampoon Lampang, Chiengrai, Prae, Nan and Maehongson. Maehongson is far up on the mountains and communication is so poor that it was not included in the study. CROPS GROWN. The most important crop in this northern section is glutinous rice. It is the main food of the people. However, the land which is really fit for rice farming is relatively small in area compared with central Siam. A part of the North is high land, more than 1,000 feet above sea level. The soil is sandy so a good crop is sure only for the years with plenty of rain or where irrigation is good. However, there is always something grown and great famines in which the people starve are now unknown. Two kinds of rice are grown, glutinous and non-glutinous. Around the larger towns where communication is good, such as Chiengmai, the farmers grow about 30% of non-glutinous rice for sale to the people in town. When the price of padi is high they scnd some of this by trains to Bangkok. In places where communication is poor or more expensive, only an insignificant (about 5) per cent of non-glutinous rice is grown. This is used for cakes or sweetmeats by the northern people. 142 In the central plains of Siam where water can be conserved for a long period, three varieties can be grown namely---early medium and late. In the northern section on account of water conservation only 2 varieties namely medium and dry season varieties are grown. Late varieties yield no grain on account of the drought before the rice is matured. So the rice grown in the North must be the one that will mature in from 4 to 41/2 months. Most of the non-glutinous variety matures in 4 months and the glu- tinous in 41/2 months. Varieties that require longer than 41/2 months are useless in the North. Other than rice, tobacco, pickled tea leaves (meang), peas, beans, bananas, cabbages, onions, garlic, lamyai <1(Nephelium longana),>1 papaya, areca nut, betel leaf and many other crops are grown. Tobacco is grown on the river banks or on low lands, which are flooded and covered with silt deposits yearly. The home grown and cured tobacco is smoked by men and children. During the last five years, when the price of rice was high and money was made more easily, some changed to varieties of cheap imported cigarettes ; but the slump in trade and prices has reduced the use of imported tobacco greatly. Tea leaves for pickling are grown on trees on the mountain Peas, beans, cabbages, onions, garlic and lamyai are grown for home use but can be grown for the Bangkok market since the climate, soil and water are fitted for producing these crops. If the cost of production and transportation could be brought lower and some study be applied to the matters, good vegetable crops could be grown in Bayab and sent to the Bangkok market. All vegetable crops are grown well in San Sai, Mae Rim and San Kambaeng villages in Chiengmai, or in any places where the land can be irrigated. Land that can be irrigated in Chiengmai is already fairly well taken up, but rich virgin lands are still plentiful elsewhere in the North. In some places in Chiengrai such as in the village Mae kam, the land is very rich. Good rice can be grown there. 14h The quality is as excellent as that obtained from Nagor Chaisri. Unions, peas and beans can be grown there with less labor than is now done in Klong Damnern Saduak. PREPARATION OF RICE SEED-BEDS. The northern farmers start plowing their seed-beds or nurser- ies about June, or as early as the rain softens thc soil. Some cattle dung is put on the seed-bed particularly in sections of poorer land. Most of them work the seed-bed carefully. They usually plow it twice, then harrow and level it. During the time the farmers are preparing the nursery seed- bed, they keep the padi seed under water for 24 hours and then put it in a warm place for germination. They broadcast the germinated seed on the nursery-beds. From that time it takes from one to one and a half months before the young plants can be pulled up and transplanted to the main fields. After the seed-beds have been prepared, the farmers start plowing their main fields. This is usually in the latter part of June or early July. In some places where the weeds are numerous, the farmers plow twice. However, the soil is sandy, so most of them plow only once. Then they allow the weeds to die out before har- rowing and leveling the land. The soil is then ready for transplanting. In some places such as at Mae Hiah in Chiengmai, the soil is a heavy white or grayish clay. This kind of soil is rather hard to work. It settles very compactly 48 hours after it has been plowed to a hard surface, that cannot be opened for transplanting by the pressure of the fingers. Here pointed sticks are used to make holes before the young seedlings are planted. Most of the farmers have their padi seedlings transplanted in August and start harvesting in December. The transplanting and harvesting require a large amount of hand labor, so most of the farmers help each other in turn, in order to finish the work at the fixed date, Some farmers after transplanting go through their farms and weed the fields, but the majority do not. The typical northern soil is sandy and lacks humus. TWo crops can be grown yearly where 144 water is available; but they should be rice and then peas, beans or tobacco (not the same type of crops in the same year). This rotation enables the land to rest. There is still a great deal of unused land in Bayab; but the lack of water in the dry season prevents the growth of irrigated rice crops on much of it. The price of land that can be farmed for technique among the peasants, was as high as 240 Baht per rai weirs on the large streams. Many of the large streams were surveyed by the Irrigation Engineer 18 years ago. If the Irrigation Department continues and repeats this work, more water can be made available for agricultural purposes. Irrigation work in Bayab is not as difficult a problem as it is in the central plains. The streams, where the weirs should be constructed, are not very deep. During the dry season the water runs regularly; but in the wet season the water increases in volume and ffoods occur. Sluices, if necessary, should be constructed close to the weir to drain off the excess water during the wet season. In the North the farmers know something of the necessity for selection of seed. They plant two kinds of rice, glutinous and non- glutinous. The non-glutinous rice always mixes with the glutinous rice, and when large amounts are mixed, it lowers the price of rice. So a type of seed selection for separating the glutinous from the non-glutinous rice has been forced on the farmer. There are two methods of selection used. The one is to select about a litre of the ' best ears of glutinous rice, and to plant this in a small plot for seed. This is done once every three years. The other is to ears which have been mixed. The remainder is used for seed. 145 This method has to be carried out every year, because some non- glutinous ears are always appearing in the bundles. For other crops, no seed selection is carried out. In B. E. 2460 and 24G2 the great flood and drought had no apparent effect on the rico seed of Bayab. FERTILIZATION AND MANRING. No commercial fertilizer is used by the farmers of the North. Manure is used in some parts, where the water supply is irregular or on the places where the soil is very poor. In the places where water is plentiful, manure is sometimes used, but only on the second crop. The excretions of pigs, chickens and cattle and green manure are sometimes used as manure. In places where the soil is poor and water is irregular, such as in Mae Hiah, the increase by using manure varies from 12 to 25 per cent. On ordinary soil the increase varies from 3 to 10 per cent. In places where water supply is regular few care to use manure. The farmers who plant tobacco on the lands which are not flooded, generally put manure about their tobacco plants. They know that if no manure is used, the tobacco will not be strong, and also that its burning quality will be poor. Nature has taught them something about improved agriculture, but science can teach them much more. AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY AND POWER. Most of the farmers in the North plow their own farms except tle well-to-do. These few keep hired laborers to do most of the work. The plow used is made of wood except a share of cast iron. Most of the farmers made their own plows except the share. The shares cost about 50 stang each. This wooden plow can only work on soil which had been softened by water. The harrow is made of hard wood by the farmer himself. No other machine is used. At the most, the plow used in the North can plow only 3 inches deep. Both plows and harrows are very inefficient. The cart is very strong, the axle being made of a steel bar and the rim of the wheel being covered with an iron band. Two oxen are generally used for drawing this cart. The cart has no 146 roof. Most of the carts are used for transporting bricks and stones as well as padi. The stones are used for roads and the bricks for buildings. Both oxen and buffaloes are used in the agriculture here. The oxen are used for drawing the carts and for plowing only on the fields not covered by water. These can work in the sun but not in the heavy rains or on lands under water. The buffaloes prefer rains and water-covered soil. They are heavier and stronger than the oxen, but they tire more quickly in the heat. These people use animals for farming less than in the central plains. In the central plain the animals are used for plowing, harrowing and threshing, but in the North the animals are used only for plowing and har- rowing. Threshing is done by hand. They need to be taught how to use the animals for threshing. Further, in the central plain the broadcasting of rice eliminates some hand labor and places it on the animals through the practice of harrowing and plowing in the seed. In this section, the farmers transplant rice as said before. This may be because the area for growing rice is small. They have to farm carefully so they transplant their padi. The yields of padi per rai vary from 12 to 45 tang of 20 litres' depending upon the fertility of the soil and the amount of water available. The gray clay soil of Mae Hiah in Chiengmai, if no manure is applied, yields only about 12 tang of padi per rai. In Mae kam (Chiengrai), a place with a good supply of water and silt deposits yearly, about 45 tang of padi per rai are secured yearly. The rice land of the North may be classed as follows:---- 1. Poor land with yields from 12--20 tang per rai (if manured). 2. Medium land with yields from 20- 35 tang per rai. 3. Good land with yields from 35--45 tang per rai. The tobacco, peas, beans, cabbages, onions, garlic, lettuce, pomelo, oranges, betel, areca and bananas are grown for homo 147 consumption only. The diet study shows the value of the consumption of beans as a protein food in the North. Although tobacco is grown mostly on the banks of rivers, in Chiengrai it can be grown on the rice farms after the harvest. Now most of the farmers grow only a small area for home consumption. The yields vary from 11/2 to 21/2 biculs of dried leaf per rai. If more is grown than for home con- sumption, the surplus is sold on the local market. These are mice, ants, rice crabs, biting and sucking insects and worms. The insects do not do much harm to the rice crop, but they are a problem in the tobacco fields. They reduce the amount produced and harm the quality of the leaves. This sucking insect is as large as a pencil point and green in color. It stays under the leaves of both young and grown plants, and sucks the sap, retarding the growth of the leaves. There are also some insects which harm vegetable crops and fruit trees but these are not serious. The climate checks their numbers. The dry and extremely hot air in the summer and the cool air of the winter reduce the numbers of the insects. Ants often eat the tobacco seeds. The farmers fight only the large worms that attack their tobacco and vegetable leaves. The method of control used is to pick off the worms by hand. Other than this no methods of control of crop parasites are used. Harvesting is done by hand just the same as in the central plain of Siam, but the stalks of rice are cut longer than is customary in the central plain. The threshing is done by hand in a fashion which requires a great amount of human labor. Each person takes a pair of sticks about 60 centimetres long. These are connected at one end by a small rope about 30 centimetres long. The bundle of rice is put between the two sticks and grasped tightly. The bundles are beaten over a bamboo pole into a basket or on the ground. When the grain 148 is all out of the straw, they pour it out and fan out the chaff, as it is thrown into the air. Two men fan if there is no wind. No harvesting or threshing machines are used. The grain storage is fairly good. The farmers build small buildings about 5 to 6 feet high, separately, but near to the houses and keep the rice thero. As the storage is high above the ground and the air can pass around the grain, the rice is kept better than by the methods used in the central plain. For rice, these people particularly need scientific seed selection to increase the yields and to improve the quality. The selection used now is only to eliminate the non-glutinous seed from the glutinous and <1vice versa.>1 The one-head-to-a-row method of seed selection used at the Rangsit Experimental Farm needs to be intro- duced and used in the North. This practice can be carried on by the farmers if they are taught. There are many methods of seed selection. The important point is to induce seed improvement. For other crops, where no seed selection is used, a technique is needed. The soil in San Sai, Mae Rim, San Kambaeng and San Manapon in Chiengmai and Mae Kam in Chiengrai is good for vegetable crops such as cabbages, onions, garlic, etc. If labor saving implements are used and a proper irrigation system is carried out, these will reduce the cost of production so that with proper development Bayab can supply good vegetables for the Bangkok market. Oranges are imported yearly to Bangkok. This fruit grows well in about 20o altitude, that of Chiengrai. The Chinese orange or better fruit should be introduced into Chiengrai and grown under the observation of agricultural and horticultural specialists. If good oranges of marketable quantity and quality can be grown successfully at Chiengrai, then this district can supply the oranges to Bangkok which are now imported. Cigarette tobacco leaves also grow well in Chiengrai. As the climate is dry and hot in the summer, sun-cured leaves can be produced here the same as in China. There seems no need for 149 flue-curing by the use of artificial heat at present. The most important enemy to tobacco in the North is the sucking insect. This is found in nearly every place where tobacco is grown. Methods of control and elimination of this insect should be found and spread among the people. Cotton also can be grown successfully here, but it is not done to any large extent, as there is no local market for raw cotton. Big efforts have not been made to introduce its cultivation. In the places where the soil is poor such as Mae Hiah, the farmers are very careful about preparing their rice seed-beds. They put manure on their seed-beds to encourage quick and vigorous growth, but in the rich soil districts the farmers do not pay partieular attention to their rice seed-beds. More attention to manuring will yield better results. The farmers know how to irrigate their lands, but yhe technique is inefficient. They need expert advico and guidance in irrigation. For instance, many failures have occured in making weirs and ditches, because the peasants do not know how to use a level and how to construct strong weirs. Drainage is not yet required as the soil is sandy and the elevation is more than 1,000 feet above sea level. Since the technique of agriculture is so undeveloped, probably the best way of improving it at once is to start seed selection for padi, tobacco and vegetables. Breeding and introducing a good orange would also be of particular immediate benefit. Since the soil is sandy, the greatest requirement for the soil is humus. The greater use of natural manure and cover crops should be encouraged. At present commercial fertilizer probably cannot be used economically. The soil in Lampang, Prae and Nan has an unusual amount of some kinds of mineral salt in it. This has brought about peculiar problems which cannot be discussed here, but the soil requires analysis. An educational program should be developed regarding best methods of handling the peculiar soil problems to be found in these provinces, 150 The first essential in farm machinery is a good plow and harrow and the wide-spread introduction of these with knowledge as to their proper use. The present method of harvesting by hand is good, but the threshing should be done by animals in place of men. If machinery is used it will have to be simplified and altered to the condi- tions of the country and the purses of the farmers. <1NORTH-EASTERN SECTION. The land of this section is on the Korat plateau. Only a few rivers and streams are found And most oF the stream-beds are dry in the dry season. CROSS GROWN. The crops grown here include rice, maize (in a very small area) some cotton, tobacco, bananas, mangoes, pomeloes, oranges, cocoanuts, areca nuts and betel leaf. About 70 per cent of the rice grown here is the glutinous and about 30 per cent is the non- glutinous. Three varieties are grown, depending upon thc level of land and the supply of water. On places away from the Mekong the medium variety with about 4 months growing season is used. The early variety with about 3 months growing season is used on the high land, and the late variety of about 5 months growing season is used in the swamps or on the low land. On the places close to the Mekong river, where the water will stay on the land longer, the late (5 months) variety is preferred. The early variety is used on the high lands only and in small areas, Next to rice, tobacco assumes economic importance. 1t is grown in a small area except in Nongkai, where it is grown on the banks and on the islands of the Mekong. The tobacco grown in Nongkai supplies the people in Udorn and Khonkaen. As the land is hot and dry in summer, it is hard to grow anything except some wild fruits that can stand the climate. Some of these are ma-fai <1(Baecaurea sapida),>1 cor-land <1(Nephelium>1 <1hypoleun),>1 etc. Vegetables are also grown close to the houses, 161 but only a small area is planted because the Watering is done by hand. TILLAGE. They usually prepare their nursery-beds in May and start transplanting about July. The early crop is harvested about October and the medium and late ones about December. The farmers here plow their land about three inches in depth. Transplanting and harvesting are done by cooperative labor. After plowing, they let the weeds rot, if there is water on the farm, or dry up if not. About one or two weeks later they harrow and cover the partly dead or partly rotten weeds under the soil. Then the soil is leveled ready for transplanting. The soil in this section has from 5 to 6 months to rest, 3 months of which it is perfectly dry and baked by the sun. Most of it is sandy. A few places have some clay. IRRIGATION AND DRAINAGE. Water is plentiful in the rainy season, but in the dry season there is no water except in the swamps and some rivers such as the Nam Mool, Nam Chi and Nam Songkram. Their tributaries do not begin in the mountains as do those of the rivers in the northern section, so there is little supply in the dry season. One way to remedy this shortage is to deepen the old swamps and make them reservoirs. All small streams should have sluices at the places where they join the larger ones. If sluices are built, more crops and animals can be raised in this section. Drainage is not required at present. Places close to Mekong river need some control of the river water. During the rise of the Mekong the water rushes in and, with the heavy rain, spoils the young padi plants. The country people should be encouraged to make a road embankment at places along the west bank of Mekong. This will prevent some of the rushing in of the water from Mekong and the spoiling of the young padi crop. The inlets should have sluices on them to control the water. Some of these sluices can be made of wood, but the larger ones should be wooden gates in masonry. 152 They serve first to delay the rushing in of the water and the spoil- ing of the crop during the early part of the rice season; later they hold the water level up when the river subsides. These wooden sluices can be made locally by the farmers themselves if the Nai Amphurs or the Governors will show them how and encourage them. For further analysis of the problem of flood gating the smaller irrigation channels leading from the Mekong see the Chapter on <1Regional Problems.>1 Seed selection in this section is for rice only and, as in the North, the chief purpose is to prevent the mixing of the non-glutinous and the glutinous rice. Since this section lacks a good regular supply of water, the farmers think very little of improving their crop by seed selection. They think more about water than seed, in spite of the fact that seed selection would help their production greatly. No particular attention is paid to seed selection other than mentioned above. During the years B. E. 2460 and 2462 the flood and drought had little effect on the seed of this section. Most of their seed is ordinary unselected glutinous rice so the bad years could not harm it particularly. Where the soil is poor, manure is sometimes put on the nursery-beds. Seldom is it put on the main fields. Most of the farmers say they know that if they put manure on thcir farms they will get better crops, but they seldom do it. There is a custom in Nagor Raja- sima, observed on the 3rd. month and 3rd. day of the waxing moon (the first month is about December) of putting a handful of cattle dung and a piece of salt at every inlet of the irrigation channel on their farms. This is probably a relic of an old Khmer custom con- cerning putting manure on the rice farms. As from February on the farmers are free, they should carry as much cattle dung as they have and put at the inlets. When the rain comes the water will wash the manure and deposit it on the farms. The practice now of using one handful of manure for each inlet is of no value. 163 The farmers who grow tobacco on the land where there is no silt deposit know very well that if no manure is applied, their crop will be poor and the tobacco will not be strong. Accordingly they manure the land once or twice for each crop. They apply from a quarter to a half handful to each plant each time. For vegetables they seldom apply manure. The manure used in this section is the excretion from cattle, pigs and poultry. The farmers who plant tobacco and vegetables on the river banks or on the low lands where silt is deposited yearly do not care for manure. Thus manuring in this section consists almost entirely of a little for tobacco on non- silted soils. AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY AND POWER. The plow used here is made of wood with the cast iron share the same as in the central plain. Most of the farmers make their own, buying only the iron share which costs about 30 stang a piece in the Northeast. This plow cannot be used on dry land, but only working on the wet soil. It will require a good deal of demonstra- tion and persuasion to introduce any improved plow here. However a good plow is badly needed, particularly one which will plow the dry soil. The harrow is also made at home from hard wood. This hard wood harrow can work only on wet rice land. It costs the farmers nothing except their labor. It is worth very little as an instrument for cultivation on even the wet land. In time they will probably buy small harrows and plows of an improved sort if properly encouraged. No other machinery is used in this section. One portable motor pump had been introduced, but the water lift was high and the soil was sandy, so the pump did not irrigate a very large field. It would have done better in a place of less lift and of firmer soil. The cart is of an ancient style with a roof. The axle is made of wood and no grease is used. Wherever there are carts, their singing noise is heard long distances away. The cart is not strong and cannot carry much, particularly on account of the axle. It is suitable to the Northeast of the present only to the extent that if 154 anything breaks it can be repaired at the place. When metalled roads are constructed, the type used in Chiengmai will probably be better adapted to the Northeast. Both buffaloes and oxen are used for carting and plowing, the same as in the North. Animals are used more here than in the North. They are used for plowing, harrowing, part of the threshing and carting. Transplanting, harvesting and the other part of the threshing is done by hand. The farmers here first beat the bundles of ears on the ground to get out some of the grain. Then they pile up the rice stalks and let the animals walk on them until all the grains drop out of the ears. Thus part of the threshing is done by hand and part by animals. The rice is transplanted. The yield varies from 14 to 32 tangs of 20 litres per rai. The places that give good yield are those close to the Mekong. There floods occur yearly. The late variety is preferred there. About 35 per cent of non-glutinous and 65 per cent of glutinous rice is grown north of the railroad from Nagor Rajasima to Ubol, but in Nagor Rajasima the people are more like those of the central plains and grow about 80 per cent of non- glutinous rice. Next to rice is tobacco. It is grown in every community, but just enough for home consumption. Bananas, oranges, pomelo, pomegranate, and vegetables are also grown for home consumption. The vegetables are mostly grown on the stream banks. Some enemies of the rice crop are mice, crabs, worms and insects. The crabs, worms and insects are not serious as the summer is very hot and dry. The climate checks their numbers. The farmers do not seem to care especially about pests, since the damage they do is not serious. The mice, crabs and large worms are killed by hand as much as possible. For insects they know no methods of control except to make a smoke smudge and to drive the insects away. Thanks to the hot dry weather, insects are not as numerous as they might be in damper and cooler areas. 155 THRESHING AND HARVESTING. Harvesting is done by hand. The stalks are made into bundles. During the harvesting season, the farmers help each other in turn. Hired laborers are hardly used in this section. Those few found were mostly paid in rice instead of money. Threshing is partly done by hand and partly by animals as described before. Grain storage is not as good as in the North. The usual granary is about 3 feet high with a thatched roof, and not as clean and well constructed as in the North, so there is more loss of grain. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS FOR THE NORTHEAST. Tobacco and cotton for export should grow well in this section. Rice should be grown in the low lands where water collects. It should be grown as early as possible, say in June, while cotton and tobacco should be grown on the high level land where water does not collcct and stay on the land. These two crops----cotton and tobacco---should be planted in the month of July or early August. Both of them will make good growth during the latter part of the rainy season and mature their crops in the dry season, about necember or January. The harvesting work can be done in February or early March. By planting these two other crops, the farmers will be busy nearly all the year around except for a month of rest in March or April. In May they have to start plowing their lands for rice. If they are going to plant cotton and tobacco during the latter part of the rainy season, they will have to prepare their seed-beds carefully and put manure on them to encourage the growth of the seedlings. Pcanuts can be grown here for human food and for feeding the pigs sent to Nagor Rajasima. More manure should be put on the seed-beds or nursery-beds for padi. For tobacco the seed-bed should be covered to prevent the heavy rain from spoiling the young seedlings. If these two crops are to be introduced in quantity, the work should be done under the expert guidance of agricultural specialists, who would demonstrate the best methods. Otherwise, the effort will fail. Those who live on the plateau away from the Mekong river 156 Those who are close to the Mekong need embankments and flood gates to keep the water from rushing in and spoiling young padi during the early part of the season and from rushing out too much later. These improvements can be carried out largely by the farmers themselves if the local officials with the help of engineers will explain the methods and the benefits to the people. Only minor improvements such as small embankments and small flood gates can be built by the people. Preparing the swamps and the lakes as reservoirs will also have to be superviscd from above. The major work such as construction of large improvements or barrages should be carried out by the government but these can be done after the country people are encouraged to do the smaller pieces of work and see the benefits therefrom. A swamp boundary survey is needed as shown by the discussion in the Chapter on <1Regional Problems.>1 In some places, as near Sakolnagor and along much of the land near the Mekong, the farmers often lose their crops by both flood and drought due to the rise of Mekong at the same time as the heavy rain and the rapid disappearance of water later. Since there is no real seed selection carried out it should be started. The one-head-to-a-row method such as practiced at the Rangsit Experimental Farm should be introduccd. Also a new variety that will stand drought should be developed and introduced. For tobacco, the cigarettes leaves such as grown in U. S. A. should be introduced, developed and acclimatized under the supervision of specialists. Cotton should be introduced into the uplands. Some is grown now but it is of poor quality with lint from 5/8 to 3/4 inch long and the productivity is small. New improved varieties from Cambo- dia, India, and the U. S. A. should be introduced with lint about one inch long. It will have to be acclimatized and improved under the supervision of specialists, same as tobacco. The country needs improved forage grasses of all kinds espec- ially those drought resisting types. More animal feeding should be done on account of the cost of transportation and the needs of the Bangkok market. This is now a great place for furnishing surplus 157 animals to the central plain and the South. The forage grass problem cannot be emphasized too mueh, but a number of good forage grasses, which will adapt themselves to this soil and climate have been introduced and tried at Pak Chong Serum farm. Some distribution of these grasses have been made. Commercial fertilizer, for the present time, cannot be afforded. After the people learn to use humus and manure on soil, they can try this if they can afford it. As the population, in the comparison with the area, is small and the soil is sandy, there may be some benefits from labor saving machine but no one knows what to try. Furthcr, machinery is expensive. Some experimental work should be done. A rice seed drill for sandy soil might be tried if therc was some development of a more drought resisting variety of rice. Wheat would probably do well if there was a market or a need for it. Perhaps the people could learn to eat wheat. SOUTHERN SECTION. This is the area in the peninsula from Lang Suan south. It is a "green jungle" area largely undeveloped as far as agriculture is concerned. CROPS GROWN. The rice grown here is about 98 per cent non-glutinous, and probably 2 per cent glutinous. As the level of the soil and the amount of rainfall varies greatly, they grow the early, medium and late varieties depending upon the area. The early variety mature here in 31/2 months, the medium 4 and the late in from 41/2 to 51/2 months. The farmers select the variety to fit their land. On low lands they use the late variety, in some places where rain is irregular the medium variety is preferred. Other crops grown in this section are cocoanut, rubber, tobacco maize, vegetables, and fruits such as the rambutan <1(Naphelium lappaceum),>1 the mango, the mangosteen, the langsart <1(Lansium domesticum),>1 the katorn <1(Sando>1 <1ricum mdicum),>1 the durian, etc. The durian, rambutan and mango- steen are sent to Bangkok market, but the quality is not as good as 158 those grown nearer Bangkok. This is the result of no selection of plants and poor methods of cultivation. PREPARATION OF SEED-BEDS. Most of tHe farmers in this district prepare their rice seed- bed about June and transplant their seedlings about latter part of July or August. In some parts of Jumbor and Surashtra Dhani, in the low lands where the grass grows high, the farmers cut the grass close to the soil and take all thc folliage away. Then large herds of buff-alo trample on the soil and stirit. They let the roots of grass stay under water to ferment for 10 days. Then transplanting starts. About a month later the farmers have to weed the padi land by eutting the grass close to the soil under the water. This is evidently a very inefficient method of cultivation. However, in the ordinary farms of this section where no tall grass grows, the farmers plow the land. They also carry the har- vested crops home. The women do the transplanting and harvesting. However this sex division of labor is dying out except in some places in Trang. To-day both sexes work equally in any of the parts of cultivation they can manage. The plow used in this southern section is also made of wood with a share of cast iron. It cannot plow deeper than 3 inches at the most. The harrow is also of wood and made by the farmers. themselves. Most of this section has sandy soil but in some places it is made of decomposed laterite. Most of the soil in the rice farms has 6 months of rest because the farmers do not plant two crops a year even if they have water, as they do in a part of the territory. A few plant some vegetables in small areas as a second crop. IRRIGATION AND DRAINAGE. This section on the peninsula has a good climate for fruit production. There is rain nearly all the year round. Only a small area is fitted for rice farming and much of that is uncultivated. The rest is cultivated poorly. Irrigation work, if carried out in the South, will help to increase the area available for rice farming, but 159 it is not needed in many areas until the farmers use what they have more efficiently. It will probably bc more economical if this southern section be utilized more for other crops than for rice, some of these are rubbber, cocoanut, palm oil, cocoa, casava, durian, mangosteen, rambutan, etc. All these crops do not require as much water as rice and it rains some every month of the year. The small amount of extra water needed is not a serious irrigation problem. The rice for the southern people eventually should be sup- plied largely from the central plain of Siam. However for the present population there is still a good deal of vacant rice land. Drainage is not particularly important. The question of wash-outs is to be considered in the future, as most of the hills are not very far away. When heavy rains come large heads of water often rush down. At the present time only a small area is utilized for agriculture, so the problem is not important. There are some streams and falls that supply water all the year round. If strong dams and ditches were constructed a greater area of land could be irrigated. SEED SELECTION AND PLANT BREEDING. There is practically no seed selection except to rid the rice grain of other varieties. Improving quality and quantity of return by seed selection is not done. For other crops such as rambutan, mangosteen, durian, lang- sart, no selection is carried out. On the large cocoanut plantations the people know the methods and values of selection, but the majority buy the seeds from the plantations which produce a good quality. At present there is no cocoa grown for commerce here, although it could probably be produced successfully. Proper methods of plant- ing, cultivation, pruning, selection and propagating fruit-trees should be introduced. At present the methods are inadequate. Fruits from this section can supply the Bangkok market and the farmers of the central plain. If special cars are constructed for carrying fruits, the North and Northeast could be supplied from here, but it will probably be more economical to develop the fruit industry of the 160 North first. The ffood of B. E. 2460 and the drought of B. E. 2462 did not have any effect on padi seed in this section. FERTILIZATION AND MANURING. The soil in this section is sandy. If manure were used it would increase production, but except for a few near Songkhla and Trang, the farmers do not use it. Around Songkhla, after the padi seedlings have been pulled from the nursery-bed,the roots are put in a solution of mud and bat-guano for a night and transplanted the next morning. Around Trang the farmers put the cattle dung on the nursery-beds, but not on the farms. They seldom apply manure to vegetables. The few Chinese who farm here, however, apply manure to every crop. The manures used are the excrement of pigs, chickens, ducks and cattle. No commercial fertilizer is used in this section. If a little fertilizer were used the yield would probably increase. Since the soil in most parts is sandy, all leaves and every kind of refuse should be applied on the soil and turned under. Cover crops and rotation should be practised. More humus should be added to the soil and the physical condition of the soil should be better. The soil evidently lacks certain essential elements. The fruit-trees grow almost wild without cultivation and the only thing the people work for is rice. Living is easy so the people farm carelessly. They want only the year's supply of padi for their family. The people know the value of manure but they do not use it. AGRICULTURAL MACHINERY AND POWER. The Southern plow is also made of wood with a share of cast iron. It is not strong. Most farmers make their own plows and harrows of wood. The " <1Kasetra">1 plow would be a great improve- ment here. More land could be farmed with less draft on the animals. No other machines were used except in one farm where a Chinese planter had intended to start a rubber plantation. When the price of rubber declined, he changed to a padi farm and used the tractors. The result was not very successful. Many things had to be altered to fit the conditions of the country. 161 Very few carts arc used in this section, except around Patani. The cart at Patani is strong and has a roof. The axle is a steel bar snd the rims of the wheels are covered with iron. The cart is not used as much in this section as in Bayab. Motor lorries are largely used for transportation of every kind of inaterial from place to place. The animals used are oxen and buff-aloes. Most of the plowing is done by oxen. The buffaloes are used for plowing in places where the land is usually- covered with water. The buffaloes breed well in Jumbor and Surashtra Dhani, but they are smaller and wilder than the type used in the central plain. The farmers seldom use them for plowing, but drive whole herds to trample the padi lands on farms where long grass grows. They are also exported to Penang and Singapore for slaughtering. As the area in padi farming for each family is small, the work done by animals is less than even in the northeastern section. Here in the low land a large herd of buff-aloes will trample on only a small area of land. There is little plowing or harrowing. Human labor is used for the transplanting, the harvesting, the weeding and in carrying the crops home. Carts are seldom used to carry the harvest home. As the farmers harvest or cut single ears at a time by a spec- ially made knife called <1Krae,>1 they harvest very slowly. One or two men loads will carry home all one person can harvest in a day. Threshing is also done by hand labor. On the farms where animals are used for plowing and harrowing, the work done by animals is less than in the other sections. SOWING PRACTICES AND YIELDS. Most of thc farmers here transplant the padi. A few of them grow the up-land padi, or hill-rice. They drop a few seeds in holes and, at the same time, drop a few seeds of maize between the rows of padi. When the rains come the maize crop matures in about 21/2 months. It is harvested and the rice is allowed to mature later. The yield of padi varies from 15 to 25 tang per rai, Rubber, cocoanuts, casa va, areca nut, betel leaves, mangosteen, 162 mango, jackfruit, bread fruit, durian, rambutan, langsart, lugu, stor <1(Parkia speciosa),>1 panieng <1(Pithocolobium jirmga),>1 etc. are also grown. Except rubber, cocoanut and casava, all other fruits are allowed to grow thickly mixed together. Each tree tries to grow up as high as it can to secure sunlight. The result is that most of the trees are above 6 metres high and produce little. The enemies of the padi are mice, crabs, sucking insects and worms. The sucking insects are bad in some years, as they suck the juice from the ears and many ears without grain are found. When the farmers find these insects they try to kill them as much as they can. When no insects appear they make no preparation and do not bother to prevent them. When they do come it is too late. THRESHING AND HARVESTING. Harvesting is done by hand. Single ears are cut at a time. Where a handful is procured it is tied into a bundle. This method is used everywhere in the South. This should be changed and the <1kiew>1 should be used as in the central plain. Harvesting by the method used in the central plain would save much time and energy. Threshing is done by hands and feet. The custom is to thresh everyday and as much as is needed for the day. This method wastes time. Threshing should be done by animals as in the central plain. No instrument is used by the farmers for harvesting and threshing except the knife mentioned above. grain storage in this section is hetter than in the northeastern section. Buildings from 2 to 3 feet high are used. The floor is made of wood. The walls of the best are made of wood and roofed with corrugated iron. The poor usually construct granaries of bamboo walls with thatched roof. Some put the grain in a room next to the kitchen. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS FOR THE SOUTH. Rice should be grown enough for food purposes, but the area is more suitable for cocoanut, casava, cocoa, palm oil, rubber, fruits and peanuts. Cocoanut should be grown along the sea-coast. 163 There still is plenty of land along the newly-constructed road from Bhuket to Takuapa. This land is close to the sea and is fitted for cocoanut culture. Farners should be encouraged to grow the cocoa- plants. Manila hemp (abaca) should be introduced. It might grow well. African palm oil should be grown on the sandy soil, where the land is not fitted for cocoanuts. Only good fruit-trees (sweet taste and improved varieties) should be grown and in rows at proper spaces, not scattered as is the case now. Pruning to keep the trees low and produce better growth should be practised. The people seem to know nothing of pruning, propagating and cultivating. The farmers should be encouraged to put manure on the rice seed-beds. Beans, peas and leguminious eover crops should be grown more in this section as these will supply humus to the soil. The leguminous plants such as Tong-larng <1(Erythrina fusca),>1 and Kra-tin <1(Lieucaena glauca)>1 should be grown. When the trees are large, they should be cut down and buried. The rootlets will furnish humus and the modules will supply nitrogenus manure to the soil. Some places on the hillsides in Java, where the soil lacks humus, quick growing leguminous plants are grown for 3 or 4 years and then cut down. The leaves and small branches are put into ditches and covered with soil, then cinchona, tea or coffee is grown. Soil in this southern section closely resembles that in Java. The treatment of the soil should follow what has been done in Java until some further studies are made. If dams and irrigation ditches are constructed, good water can be supplied to the towns and the plantations. Many hills and streams give a regular supply all thc ycar round. Many of the miners use the water from those hills and streams for their hydraulic mining. They construct ponds on dry land and flood the ponds for floating their dredges. Peanuts can be produced in abundance here on land not available for rice. Peanuts furnish a rich food for humans and for animals. The pigs shipped to the city markets can be increased in size and more can be produced by development of peanut growing to furnish a food. 164 In this section the question concerning the soil and agriculture after the tin has been mined is pertinent. The silt and rich soil are often washed away. What is left is only coarse gravel and stones, at least on the surface. Really no plant food of value is left. To remedy this, more effort should be made to keep the dirty and silty water created through the washing of tin, for putting on the land that has been mined. Only clear water should be allowed to drain off. This method has been practised by a hydraulic miner in Amphur Tungkah (or Tongkah), Bhuket. Others should be required to do this. The matter deserves <1careful public attention now,>1 for the future good of agriculture in Siam. For padi, seed selection by the method of one-head-to-a-row should be practised. The cocoanut selection should be made from large plantations with good healthy trees, good yields and medium sized fruits. For fruit-trees selection should be made for good flavors, good yields and medium sized fruits. Propagation is need- ed by margotting, cutting, grafting or budding. The people should be taught to use the natural manure and to turn under the soil any refuse they can obtain. Crop rotation and cover crops are needed badly. Some of the best agricultural methods of the central plains should be spread to the South. Yields of all crops can surely be increased greatly. Harvesting and threshing are poorly developed in this section. Single ears are cut at a time. This should be changed by using the <1kiew>1 and harvesting a handful at a time. Threshing should be done by animals as is done in the central plain. <1CENTRAL SIAM>1 This area includes all the central plains, from Bejraburi on the west to Chandaburi on the east, and north from the sea to Bisnulok. In this large area, 12 villages were studied, two near Chandaburi, two near Bangkok, and one each at Bejraburi, Bisnulok, Lobburi, Saraburi, Ayudhya, Dhanyaburi, Sabarnburi and 165 Chaxerngsao (Patriew). These areas are only small samples, but fairly representative. CROPS GROWN. In general, the non-glutinous rice may be said to be <1the crop>1 of this area. Of course, near Bangkok, fruits and vegetables for the Bangkok market become important. Further, there is a great amount of fruit and pepper at Chandaburi. Some districts produce tobacco, primarily for sale. In some of the the districts <1but by no means all>1 peas, beans and maize are produced for home consumption. The village at Dhanyaburi, the two near Bangkok, the one near Chaxerng- sao and the one in Amphur Laemsingh near Chandaburi seldom produce any of these three items. The chief characteristic of the crops of the central plain is that they are primarily grown only for sale. Under a system of specialization brought about through various customs in relationship to soils and other opportunities, the areas which grow rice, do only that. The same applies in principle to tobacco areas, to fruit areas, etc. The only exception to this are the areas which have two types of soil and two types of commercial culturey such as Ta-Mai, where half the village produces fruit for sale and the other half of the lands is in pepper. Self-sufficing agriculture, or the home production of food, is practically disappearing in the Center. Those areas which cling to the custom, unless the crisis brings a reversal of behavior, will soon disaepear. The reason seemg to he in the psychology of the operator. There is no economic reason why he should not produce his food at home. His income is certainly not too large and the distribution of labor leaves him time for home production of most of the necessities. There is always available land. However, in spite of these facts, central agriculture is specialized agriculture, far more than good economy would suggest, and, as a result, central agriculture is harmed severely by the depression. PREPARATION OF SEED-BEDS. Preparation of the rice seed-beds depends to a large extent upon the method of planting used---broadcasting or transplanting. To some extent it is affected by the type of soil,by the extensiveness 166 of farming and by the type of cultivator. On the privy Purse lands near Ayudhya, where land is farmed in units of 50 to 60 rai per household, broadcasting is used. Since the plow is very inefficient the farmer goes over the land sometimes twice. Then he broadcasts the seed and harrows it with a small wooden harrow. The other members of the family go over the land and break up some of the large clods of earth. However, in most cases the seed-bed never reaches any proper state of pulverization and the weeds are seldom killed. They are only handicapped a little. Then the inundation comes and kills the weeds. While there is a good deal of variety to methods, this is a very common one. At Chaxerngsao the farmers depended upon rain water. Trans- planting is done by hand. The land is plowed better, in nearly every case twice. It is harrowed and leveled up and is ready for trans- planting. The weeds have to be killed here to a much greater extent than in the inundated sections. North of Chandaburi, farms are smaller ; but therc is plenty of water from the streams. Here trans- planting is done and the fields are well prepared. At Laemsingh, south of Chandaburi, broadcasting takes only 10 per cent of the land. Here the farmers depend upon rain-water. Near Bangkok methods of planting depend upon the earliness or lateness of the rains. Consequently, the method of preparation of the seed-beds varies. In general, broadcasting seems a very careless preparation of the seed-bed and transplanting a much better type. At Bisnulok broadcasting is done in the low areas and transplanting in the higher areas Near Lobburi and Dhanyaburi most of the rice is broadcasted and the seed-beds suffer. However, the better farmers transplant some, depending on the season, or prepare the broadcast seed-beds better than their neighbors. As a rule, they secure from one and a half to twice the yield of their poorer neighbors. The Lao villages near Ta-Luang nearly always transplant and farm very well, probably something which they learned under the harder conditions of the North. In the West, near Subarnburi, conditions vary with the water, and preparation of seed-beds also varies. Bejraburi follows transplanting and farms very well. l67 IRRIGATION AND DRAINAGE. There are two general types of agriculture---those having irrigation and those depending on rain-water. In general, drainage is not a problem except in some specific areas, if the general problem of surface drainage on account of poor methods for plowing the soil be excepted. Irrigation is not understood very well by the farmers of the central plains. As a rule, they wait for the water. The better farmers take pains to prepare their crop plans either by bringing the water into a small piece, if there is a shortage, or by challenging problem of the whole plain is to teach proper methods of irrigation and water usage. SEED SELETION AND PLANT BREEDIHG. Little attention is paid to anything but rice. At Saraburi the better farmers select the good ears and the poorer farmers separate only the red rice seed from the white rice. At Chaxerngsao the farmers pick the best part of their fields for seed. At Amphur Laemsingh, no selection is practised, but the farmers change the seed every five years. At Bisnulok, the red and white rice are separated. At the other places, there was no evidence of seed selection found. Plant breeding was practised but little, if at all. However all of these conditions varied with the cultivator. The Bangkok landlords who personally supervise their farms often try to improve the seed on their farms, and in some cases success- fully. FERTILIZATION AND MANURlNG. Some Chinese farmers near Ayudhya use manure. Near Saraburi the farmers use manure on their seed-beds and put as much as they can secure on the fields. They appreciate the use of manure very highly. At Chaxerngsao, some of the farmers use buffalo dung on the nursery-beds. At Laemsingh the same praetice is followed by some of the farmers. North of Chandaburi, the farmers make a strong mixture of mud, fresh dung and finely ground burnt bone. They dip the plants in this overnight and transplant the 168 next morning. At Bejraburi there is some manuring of seed-beds. Other than these practices, no use or high appreciation of manure was found. No place used commercial fertilizer according to the statements of the headmen. MACHINERY AND POWER. The machinery consists of a wooden plow weighing about 28 pounds fitted with a cast iron share, a wooden rake-harrow pulled by a buffalo, a hoe shod with a metal head, a knife or sickle, and a few high wheeled buffalo carts. The power is principally by water-buffalo, because most of transportation is by boat and most of the agriculture is the wet variety unfitted to the bullock. There were a few of the Chinese slot water pumps run on the principle of the endless chain. These were very inefficient considering the power they require. Some of these are run by windmills. Some of the farmers have small gasoline engines particularly if they pump water. The principal need is for a more efficient shared plow, similar to the " <1Kasetra>1 " plow developed at the Rangsit station. They need a harrow that has less surface resistance in relation to work done. Further, they need efficient pumps in order to supplement the vagaries of the rainy season. SOME SOWING PRACTICES AND YIELDS. In general, yields are not high. Most of the territory seems to have reached that state of the soil where the plant food available for use is only that amount which naturally breaks down each year. Since, as a rule, the soil is not handled by what may be called a diversified or rotation tillage, the breakdown of the upper three inches is all that is generally used. Soils vary in their ability and there is some variation in yield. On the average it is very low, The major problem of the sandy soil is lack of humus. The problem of the heavy soil seems to be poor surface drainage with excessive acidity. The broadcast areas are the worst on account of poor tillage. No soil tests or analyses were made during this study. 169 CROP PESTS. These are crabs, mice, rats, worms, biting insects and sucking insects. These pests do much harm only on the years when rainfall is irregular. If the season is regular the padi plants are strong, and at the same time the regular rain checks their numbers, so not many appear. For citrus, there are some sucking insects that make the young fruits drop. There are some diseases that attack the leaves of many fruit trees. These are not serious as yet but they reduce the productivity of the trees. A careful study is required and proper methods of prevention are needed. The peasants know very little to do. THRESHING AND HARVESTING. Harvesting is by hand, and a handful is cut at a time. Thresh- ing is usually done by having the buffalo tramp out the seed. Both threshing and harvesting are more efficiently done in the Center than in the other districts. GENERAL CONCLUSIONS FOR CENTRAL SIAM. The problem of the central plains, from the stand-point of Siamese economy, is so great that it is not advisable to prejudge what ought to be done by too many suggestions. The whole area needs a great deal of careful study. However, it would seem that the farmers need a great deal of education and promotional work along a number of lines. These are <1soil tillage, sced selection and>1 <1plant breeding, improvement of native machinery>1 such as plows and harrows, as well as the water pump, <1use of water, home production>1 <1of food and living supplies,>1 and the <1use of manure and fertilizer.>1 The soil either lacks humus, or tends to become acid, or is not tilled properly in most sections. Seed selection is needed. A good plow, probably one developed with a better cutting share applied to the native plow. Experiments on efficient harrows are needed. A rotary pump should be substituted for the slot pump and more pumpino should be encouraged in the early part of the season. The 170 farmers need real training in the use of water, particularly in the irrigated section of the East. Food supplies, such as beans, peas pulses, maize and vegetables should be produced on every farm. There should be a better poultry stock and the people should be encouraged to depend more upon chicken or duck eggs rather than dried or imported salt fish during those times they cannot procure fresh fish from the sea or the canals. Until there is a strong development of a Siamese commercial tobacco culture, more of the farmers should produce thcir own tobacco. Most of the farmers in the Center should do more home production of clothing particularly weaving. The whole problem of manuring and proper fertilization should be attacked in detail. In this study, no attempt was made to cover the problems of animal diseases or veterinary needs. That is already being handled efficiently. However, the average animal should be fed better rations and worked more. Too much of the animal expense is merely a maintenance ration for poor and under- fed animals. Control methods should be worked out for some pests and some diseases. CHAPTER IX. INTERNAL MARKETING OF AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS. This chapter deals with the marketing of agricultural products in Siam and is limited primarily to rice marketing. Rice is the major crop of Siam and forms about 70 per cent of all exports. Obviously, the rice crop furnishes the most important marketing problem in Siam. The central plains, part of the North and the district of the Northeast around Nagor Rajasima and the railway lines, form the commercialized farming districts of Siam. The Northeast and the South and parts of the North and of the central provinces are self- sufficing districts. The general increase of purchasing and selling here is evident from the fact that rice has become the most important product for export (137,438,000 Baht in B. E. 2472). Although Siam exported in B. E 2472 teak (11,217,000 Baht), tin (22,638,000 Baht), fish (3,135,000 Baht), cattle (2,544,000 Baht) etc., all these lesser products form only a small percentage of the total amount. The teak trade and the tin industry are very largely in the hands of Europeans and Chinese. Thousands of boats carry padi from the farm districts of the central plains to Bangkok. Since the railroads (Northern Line and Northeastern Line) were completed, rice is now brought by rail from the northern and northeastern provinces. It is primarily this fact which has enabled Siam to import foreign goods. The purchasing power of the great mass of the people depend to a very large degree upon the rice crop. MARKETING IN A SELF-SUPORTING ECONOMY. At Nan in the circle of Bayab and in the villages of the East, with the exception of Nagor Rajasima, self-sufficing economy is 172 practised. The economy in these villages is very primitive. Home production plays an important part. All commodities produced by the family or within the household are consumed, for the most part, by the members of the household. As rice is the staple food for the inhabitants, the people cultivate rice primarily for their needs. Apart from rice cultivation they raise vegetables, tobacco and cotton for home consumption. In every house there is a weaver's loom which produces clothes for the family. This form of economy is mixed with that of trading with other villages. A part of the com- modities, the surplus is bartered with the people of the neighbouring villages for excess commodities produced by these other people. The trade with neighbouring villages is small and not increasing. only the surplus commodities are used as articles of barter. If a family produces more rice than the self-sufficing economy requires, the surplns is used as an article of barter for other products which the villagers desire. Rice is often bartered for baskets of salt. In the outlying villages of the East and at Nan the rice crop depends almost entirely upon rainfall. The ffuctuations of the price for padi are determined, for the most part, by the fluctuations of rainfall. If it ceases to rain while the rice plants are still growing, and it appears as if the crop will give a poor return, rice will be sold at higher prices. If there is a crop failure, the villagers do their best to secure a certain quantity of padi either through purchase or through barter in order to have their food. Rice is a standard article of barter; it was almost their money. Wages are paid in rice. Marketing is largely in the hands of women. Trade with neighboring villages is confined to the dry season only owing to lack of communication facilities. Women carry their goods to the neigh- boring villages. There exists a small trade also between the villages and the Provinces. This trade is, of course, of no significance, because many commoditics cannot be brought to the market in these towns. Transportation is difficult. In the Northeast the provincial towns are far away from the urban market (Nagor Rajasima). The distance from Nagor Rajasima to Khonkaen is covered by truck in the dry season in two days; 173 travelling by bullock carts requires at least ten days. The distance by railroad from Nagor Rajasima to Khonkaen is 184 kilometres. The study was made there just when the railway from Nagor Rajasima to Khonkaen was under construction. The trade between Nagor Rajasima and the provincial towns is confined to the dry season. Digerent kinds of goods such as matches, cotton goods, and kerosene are brought by automobile trucks from Nagor Kajasima to these places in the dry season. Only pigs are carried to Nagor Rajasima on the return journey, for the commodities are not worth the cost of transportation. Cattle are driven by foot. Since trucks are now used as means of communication, the trade which was done in the early days by trains of bullock carts is diminishing. How communication has con- tributed to the development of trade here is evident from the following. As the railroad line Korat (Nagor Rajasima) to None Wat was completed and opened to traffic, a rice mill belonging to a Chinese was established in Khonkaen in B. E. 2471. This sent 41,644 piculs of white rice from None Wat to Bangkok in B. E. 2472. For carrying the rice from the mill at Khonkaen to the station at None Wat, motor trucks were used. In the same year 12,484 piculs were carried by boat to Ubol during the rainy season and sent by rail to Bangkok from there. The measures (sat and <1tanan)>1 used by the villagers are largely standard for the village only. This is explained by the fact that the baskets used as measures are made of bamboo by hand. Each basket-maker generally has his pattern and makes all the baskets of the village. But the villages any distance away had other basket-makers and other patterns. So the size varied from village to village but not much within villages. Here rice was sold both by measure and by weight except at korat where only measures were used. MARKETING IN A COMMERCIAL ECONOMY. The central plains comprise the seven Inner Circles (Krungdeb, A yudhya, Nagor Savarga, Bisnulok, Prachinburi, Rajburi , and Nagor Chaisri). These constitute a most important rice-growing 174 region and produce a large surplus for export. This is the region of commercial agricultural economy. Agriculture in the central plains, especially rice cultivation depends largely upon regular inundations of the rivers. These seven Circles have become commercialized farming districts. In the early days the foreign trade of Siam was a monopoly whieh was abolished by the treaties with foreign powers from 1855 on. Since Siam was opened to foreign trade, there has been a mark- ed change in the economic practices of the country districts in the central plains. Instead of producing only enough rice for their own needs, as the farmers in the Center did in the timc of self-sufficing economy, they now produce a large surplus for export. The people have turned more and more towards rice cultivation. In 1928-29 the export of rice was 24,440,483 piculs with an aggregate value of 173,590,363 Baht (a pieul is 133 pounds, and one bsht is 43 cents U. S. gold). The total exports for the same year were 252,475,000 Baht. Thus the exports of rice were 68 per cent of the total value of all exports. Most of the farms in the central plains range from 30 - 200 rai in size (a rai is 2/5 of an acre or one hectare). The contrast by the fact that the farms in the central plains range mostly from 30 -- 200 rai while those in the Northeast and the South (self-sufficing economy also) range from 1 - 20 rai. There is no dry land farming here, so the peasants use only the rice land and most of the rest is free and unappropriated. Since the freedom of trade has become general, the area under rice cultivation has increased rapidly. The area used for other products, such as sugar, tobacco and cotton, which the peasants of the central plains raised in the early days for home consumption, has declined considerably. Nowadays they buy manufactured cotton goods which are brought from Great Britain, Japan and India. These have to a great extent replaced home-made clothing. Manufactured sugar, which is chiefly the produce of the Dutch Indies is a serious competitor to the home-made sugar. The imported cigarettes 175 compete with local products and have spread to the remotest villages of the interior. The cost of living of the peasants in the Center is becoming higher bccause they do not raise agricultural products other than rice for their own needs and depend upon imported goods for the supplying of their wants. The export of rice had increased considerably during the last 40 years. Farmers of the central plains sell nearly all the surplus of rice, after having kept out a certain quantity for food and for seed during the next year. The demand for rice during the last ten years had increased the value and the quantities exported. Siamese rice (being one of the best in the world) commands a better price than that of Burma and Indo-China. The world price has become an increasingly im- portant factor. In order to increase their income, peasants attempt to extend their farming by purchasing new plots of lands or by clearing off the jungle and converting it into farms. The price of white rice had increased during the last ten years. Ten years ago the average price of white rice was 6.00--8.50 Baht per picul. In 1928-29 it was 7.65-9.71 Baht per picul. Although the export of rice has increased during the last decades, the systems of weights and measures are still inadequate and the lack of market price quotations for rice among the peasants is still evident. The government has adopted Standard Weights and Measures (Law of B. E. 2466) and prices and quantities of rice sold at Bangkok have been published since B. E. 2463. However, these measures and these price quotations are still unused by the peasants. The law concerning weights and measures does not go into full effect for two more years. The old systems of weights and measures are still used, a different one for each village. A peasant does not know any rice price except that quoted in those local weights and measures by the padi dealers. THE MARKETING SYSTEM. The marketing system for Siamese rice consists of four parts--- the peasant, the dealer, the transportation method and the miller at Bangkok. As a rulc the Peasants do not sell padi direct to the rice inillers. In fact the business of transPorting the grain from the field to mills has never been scriously undertaken either by millers or by farmers. Consequently there has gmown uP a number of middlemen, who buy from the latter and sell to the former. This occuPation requires a good deal of hard work and soundness of business judgment. The local radi dealers usually possess a number of granaries for holding supplies of padi lwhich are sold to millers or padi dealers when the market prices at Bangkok rise. This gives an opportunity for sPeculating the rice Prices. Oftentimes they lend money to the farmers and take padi as interest instead of money. Most of the middlemen go out to the various villages in the central plains and other districts by boats or carts. The rice is brought down in boats and by rail to Bangkok. As a rule farmcrs do not know any rice Prices except that offered by the local dealcrs. Most of the Padi dealers are not as well informed concerning inarket rrices of padi duoted at Bangkok as they should be. Through ignorance of the farmera regarding the market prices, the middlemen are often able to buy at prices which leave them a large margin of profit (in those farm districts which are far away from the market). The chronic imPecuniosity of some farmers often compel them to sell their cror as soon as it has been reaPed, and in such cases the middlemen tend to buy lower in comparisen with Bangkok Prices. <1Peasants haue not developed a>1 <1method of selfdefence.>1 On the other hand there is another side to the situation. The industry of padi buying is very comPetitive. There are hundreds of padi buyers and they all want to Profit as much as they can. They can only do this by buying large quantities of rice and by selling it at a profit. So they comPete with each other and drive down the profits of the busiuess. Since the cost of doing business is very low, the ordinary padi dealer can afford to buy on low margins. The padi dealer and his family generally live on the boat and all of the membara work. It does not cost much to operate a boat. Consequently the radi dealer is generally forced by competi- tive bidding to pay good Prices for padi in relationship to Bangkok rrices. Further, the dealer may buy when Prices are high and be forced to sell when prices are low. He has money invested in buy- ing padi, and this money requires a heavy interest payment, probably averaging not less than 10 or 12 Per cent. <1So the>1 <1 deffalr also has no method>1 of <1self-defence.>1 He has no guarantee that the market will not decline. There is no auch thing in the rice industry in this country as a " futures" market which the dealer may use to guarantee his prices. Under the futures markct system, the dealer who purchases graiu in the country " sells" a grain con- tract in the market or exchange that same day. Then if the market goes down a few cents, the dealer loses ou that which he has Purchasd in the country aud gains on the contract which he has sold in the market or exchange. As a result the dealer is guaranteed that he will not make a speculative gain or loss. The costs of his business are limited to the non-sPeculative exPenses and he may oPerate on a smaller margin. 'The work regarding the internal marketing of agricultural products is divided into three Parts :---- 1. <1Weights and increases.>1 The Purpose is to examine the measuring instruments used by the villagers or Padi dealers. As rice iS the principal product for exporting, more stress was laid on meaauring instruments for Padi, which are used in the pillages atudied. The <1tang>1 or <1sat>1 which was used in the village and for selling Padi to middlemen, was selected and filled with padi. This was to find out how many standard litres and kilograms of rice one <1tana>1 or one <1sat>1 contained. If the selling Prices of the villages known, this enables the calculation of local Prices for paddiper standard <1kwien>1 (~,000 litres). These are the Pricea which the middlemen pay the farmers. 2. <1information on prices padi for>1 padi <1in the villages>1 wealthy people, i.e. those who sold large quantities of padi were asked to give the Prices received for padi sold to padi dealers duriug the selling seaaon. Wheu they Were together, they were able to give accurate information. If some one made a mistake in stating the price, another would obiect to this at once. In this way the average Prices for Padi were determined very accurately. The peasants do not write down the prices of padi, but they remember very well the highest and lowest Pricea of radi duriug the mouths of the selling seaaon. The data were collected for the selling season only. a. <1General info-mation and observation of marketing prac->1 <1t->1ices. This was done for inany villages not included in the 40 studied most intensively. MEASURES USED. From Table IX A it will be aeen that in the villages studied, the sizes of the measures <1(sat>1 and <1tanan)>1 varied from village to village. In the northern provinces tho <1tang>1 (basket) which was used in the village and for aelling Padi to the middlemen contained from 26.3 to 37.9 litres (of ordinary and of glutinous rice). At Prae and Nan the measures used by the villagers varied from 26.3 to 35.7 litres. In the villages of the Northeast (with the exception of Nagor Rajasima), where the self-suffcing economy is practised, the peasants produce glutiuous rice for their own needs. The size of the measnre did not vary much. It ranged from 20 to 29 litres At Udorn a <1tang>1 containing 29 litres was used. In the South, where the self- sufficing economy also Plays an important part, the measure used iu the villages varied from 18.7 to 22 litres. In the central plains the size of the measuring instrnments is smaller than in the other parts of the country, except at the village near Bisnulok. It ranged from 11 to 20.9 litres. The measure used in the village Ta Tong near Bisnulok contained 26 litres. In general, the variation in measures is so great, that it is almost impossible for the average peasant or for anyone else to know what he receives for rice in relation to the uuit quoted on the Bang- kok market. However, the situation is uot as bad for the peasant as it appears on the surface. The padi dealers compete with each other and recognize some diffierences for weight (quality). On the whole, however, the balance of the information favors the buyer not the seller. Padi is sold by basket measure everywhere in Siam except a part of the Northeast, where it is also sold by wcight. The baskets vary in size from village to village almost without rhyme or reason. The padi buyers often dictate the size of the measnring instrument which is used in selling. If the rice is heavy, more is sometimes paid for it. If the rice is light. less is paid for it. The weight is nsed princirally as a grading factor. This study did uot deal with the inethods of purchase by the miller. PRICE AND PRICE QUO-TATIONS. The previous rages have shown tbe difficulty of finding the rrices paid for the ice on the farm. In the face of this difficulty, we have tried to assemble the best statistics that could be secnred. These are presented in Tables IX A through F in tbe aPrendix. The firat tables give aualytical information concerning relative pricea at important Points and the Bangkok Prices. From these tables several conclusions may be suggested. The close relation between Bangkok Prices and uPcountry prices indicates that the Peasant is, on the whole, receiving a <1compctitivc>1 pm-ice for his ice. When Bangkok rrices are stable, country prices and Bangkok Prices tend to <1approac an equctlity>1 gains Then the dealer lose money, become frightcned and quit buying. This is followed by a period in which those Peasants who have to sell must give the dealer high margin because the dealer is afraid that he will loae his money. The system is best at the large markets and poorest at the smaller ones. This is because of more competition at the larger markets. The general trade depression, which has affected rice Prices severely, began to affect the cultivators iu October B. E. 2473. The market price of ordinary broadcast rice dropred during Sertember and October very rapidly. In September B. E. 2473 the price was 74 Baht rer standard kwien and fell in October to 49 Baht (a difference of 25 Baht). Gardeu rice padi averaged 83 Baht iu September B. E. 2473 and dropPed in October to 66 Baht per standard kwien (a difference of 17 Baht). During December -- March B. E. 2473 a great uumber of farmers did not sell their Padi, for they hoPed that the price would go ur as usual. Those middlemen, who did marketing during September-October made a great lose, although they were well informed concerning the market price. The average prices which they paid the farmer were higher than the mill prices. It was sPeculation which led to the great loss. The demand for rice iu the country districts ceased for many months oWiDg to the low pricea of padi. At the time of the world-wide trade deapresaion the low price, not the quality, was tbe deciding factor in aelliDg. The peasants did not wish to sell and the dealers were afraid to purchase. As to glutinoua rice, TableIX D shows that there was a great difference in Prices (farmer's selling prices and Bangkok prices), which seemed to favor the buyer. This is explained by two reasons :- 1. In general the de1nand for glutinous rice has not increased much, in comparison with that of ordinary rice. 2. The people of the North and the Northeast grow glutinous rice for the most Part primarily for Their own needs. The local prices therefore dePend uPou crops locally and not upon world Prices. Since the northern districts were connected with the capital by rail, the farmers in the north have begun to cultivate non- glutinous rice for sale, because it commands a better Price. In the villages studied, the price of the ordinary rice was slightly higher than for the glutinous. At Nan in the Bayab Circle, Nongkai aud Khonkaen in the Udorn Circle, the difference in prices, in compariaon with the Bangkok prices, ia great. As has been indicated above, the people groW glutinous rice for consumption purposes only. There is no rice trade with other districts. If the crop ia favorable, the price of padi remains very low. (At Nam Pna of Nan Province the price of padi during the harvest in B. E. 2Q72 was only 24 Baht per atandard kwien). The local prices of padi of the self-sufficing districts dePend almost entirely upon the quantities produced by farmers. At the times of scarcity padi is sold at higher prices. Thus it is not particularly a commercial marketing system. From Table IX C it will be seen that the village near Bia- nulok (Ta Tong) shoWs a great difference in prices (the farmer's selling prices and the prices quoted on Bangkok market). This is explained by the fact that Bisnulok is far away from Bangkok and the transportation of padi from there to the market requires much time. Market prices at Bangkok fluctuate very much and dealers must have a good margin. The competition among the padi dealers is not as great as it shonld be. Further, the rice is lot of first quality. The farmers depend almost entirely upon the rice cultiva- tion, although they raise vegetables and fruits for home consumption. Another reason which compels them to sell their crop at cheap prices is that the river dries np from December to April. A great nnmber of peasants sell their padi in june and july. The marketing of padi at Ban Yang (Saraburi) gives the middlemen oprortunity to make profits above the average. Rice which is grown in this Province is transplanted and of good quality. In general, this kind of rice commands a better price. There seemed to be a lack of competition in buying. The selling prices at Phra Kanong were near to the Bangkok prices. The price of padi in this village is good because transportation by water is very cheap. In this area around Bangkok, the method of transplanting is applied. The farmers are able to secure a better price for their product. In the areas Where boats are used as means of communication, padi commands a better price than in the other areas. This is explained by tWo reasons :---- First, a great number of padi dealers are residing at Bangkok and are well informed concerning market prices of padi. In this case there exists serious competition among the middlemen and the pcasant secures a better average price (nearer the market price). Second, the Provinces in the central plains are nearer to the market (Bangkok). A eomPlete system of canals eonnecting the various rivers with the main river (~enam Chao Phya) is used as means of communication. The cost of transportation by water is very cheap. This enables the padi farmer of the central plains to secure a better Price for his product. hus it is seen that competition among middlemen tends to make the market price and the padi farmer's price come closer together. The profits are large when competition lessens. This is according to the theory of " fair priee " in a competitive system. Consequently it would seem that <1the first and easiest mefhod for>1 <1improving agricultural prices in Siam is>1 to <1improup the conditions>1 <1hindering competition and the competitie su.stem.>1 This means promoting the general use of Standard Weigths and Measures throughout the country and the general circulation of market price knowledge among the farmers. Second, it has shown that <1reduced>1 <1transportation costs is the .second way to improue>1 the <1marketing>1 <1system.>1 Where possible better and cheaper transportation methods should be promoted. CONCLUSIONS. The Siamese people have known for some time of these two or three deficieneies in the marketing system. They have tried to remedy them as best as possible. New means of communications have come in, waterways have been cleaned ur, and market Prices are quoted in the Bangkok papers. The chief handicap is that it is <1uery difficult to achieve marketing reforms.>1 They <1can only be>1 <1brought about after many years of education and repeated>1 <1demonstrations.>1 It would seem that the introduction of selling by Weight ought to be general. However, the local scales used iu the country markets all over the land are not made according to any standard system. The scales are more standard than the baskets, but they also vary. Since these scales are of the balance variety and are not well constructed, the type of string or rc l l l can make a difference in weight. The poWer of the people to pur- ehase a comPlete new system of scales immediately is doubtful. In general it Would seen that a system of education in the use of seales and of selling by weight may improve the situation gradually. All the important markets may be required to put in standard metric or pound system scales and the practice will spread from these, to the lesser markets. The proposed developments of the radio system can begin to inform the farmers about market pricea. Many cannot read written reports. Public reporting of prices paid at important local markets should be encouraged as much as possible and as rapidly as possible. These should be sent to Bangkok daily and given to the public. These will tend to cause some of the unusual discrepancies to disappear. These are very serious problems and difficult of solution. Since the chief marketing difficulties are those of inadequate develop- ment of the competitive system, attention ahould be given to improving comPetition. Governmental buying, governmental price guarantee systems----all those schemes which crop up in every country during a depression, cannot solve the problems. On the contrary they would probably have the same effect in Siam that they have had elsewhere---- result in large losses to the Government and feW if any gains to the cultivator. The depression ia severe. But it is a World-wide situa- tion and no country can solve it. On the other hand, the gradual elimination of the defects of the competitive system can be brought about in the country, if the millera, the dealers and the peasants are willing to follow any Well thought out plan projected by the specialists. Co-operative marketing should be started, bnt slowly and carefully. The history of commercial agriculture is streWn with co-operative failures. These have happened because of the <1ao>1 rapid development, of wrong principles of organization, and of bad business practices. On the other hand, successful commercial agricnlture eventually becomes co-operative agriculture. Some of the finest agricultural marketing organizations are co-operative. A twenty- five year program of the development of co-operativc movement should be Plauned. An agricultural co-operative marketing system can be successful only because it shows that it is more efficient economically and socially than the independent dealer system. However, the work will have to develop slowly like the Co-operative Credit Unions. The farmers who form successful Co-operative Crcdit Unions should be encouraged to ship" their rice to the millers direct. The movement must be guided and the peasants should not be encouraged to try too much at a time. A few men should be sent to Europe and America to study the movement there. Officials who have been instrumental in developing the Credit Unions should be given preference for this training because the princiPles of organization are almost identical. Wise Progress in this resrect must be slow and eautious. AGRICULTURAL CREDIT. As this study shows clearly, credit for agriculture and an internal credit system is one of the major economic problems facin the country today. <1It is not only important><1it is prcssing.>1 In this chapter, an attempt is 1mde to show the facts re;grding the internal credit system as it exists today and the general outlines for a remedy. CREDI-T IN A SELF-SUFFICINlG ECONOMY. The credit which exists in a self-sufficing economy where farmers produce primarily for home consumrtion is of minor signifi- cance. It has the following characteristics:---- 1. Very little credit is used. 2. The chief reasou for borrowing is a famine or a crop failure. 3. Merit making at funerals and at entering the priesthood are other reasons for needing funds. The large pro- portion of these costs are borue, however by gifts from neighbors and relativ s- 4. The reasons for borrowing are considered social or public. The money or Padi lent is generally returned at the convenience of the borrower or when the leuder needs money or padi for the same purpose. 5. Security is nearly always personal. 6. Seldom is any interest required. 7. The money or padi is nearly always borrowed from rela- tives or neighbors in the same village. 8. In the majority of cases, the loans consist of padi. 9. Changes in price levels work little hardshiP ou the lender or borrower because the loan in most cases may be rePaid in kind. 1O. Credit institutions do not exist. In a commercial economy, on the other hand, very much credit is used. The chief reason for borrowing becomes that of the business--to buy land or for living expenses and farming costs whilc the crop is being produced. The reasons for borrowing are considered private and the return of the principal and payment of the interest are not only expected but, if possible, property security is taken as a guarantee. Interest is nearly always required. Its ratc dePends upon the security of the loan, the personal characteristics of the lender and the borrower and the ratio of supply of available funds to the demands in that Particular area. The money is generally ' borrowed from relative strangers----that is from persons with little interest in the lender except that the security is good and that the interest is Paid and rrincipal is returned. No matter what the loan may be, credit or money, the principal is stated iu money aud the returus are made in money or its equivalent. Changes iu the price lcvel influence both lender and borrower because, since energy for the production of an agricultural product stays about the same over a period of years, rapid changes in the price level make tremendous differences, at times, between the <1energy>1 borrowed and the <1energy>1 returned. Thus when padi is 100 Baht Per kwien, the borrowing of 100 Baht gives the borrower the use of the energy which it takes to produce a kwien of padi. If the price of padi drops to 50 Balit per kwien before the loan is rePaid, the principal then amounts to energy sufficient to produce two kwien of padi. If the interest is 20%, and the loan is only for one year, the borrower will return the equivalent of two and two- fifths kwien for the one he borrowed. In any communities of Siam in the Past year or so, the changes in the price level have been from more than 80 Baht per government kwien to less than 30, with interest rates at approximately 25 Per cent in the commercialized farming districts. If the loans had been paid back at the end of the first year, the average borrower would have been returning the equivalent of at least three for one. Since great declines in price are often more sharp and drastic to ban increaes in price, agricultural credit in a commercialized economy, where the length of the period betWeen borrowing and loaning is generally longer than in non-agricultural buaineases, changes in the price level more ofteu work to the appareut good of the lender than of the borrower. However, the aituation often becomes so drastic that the security is throwu into the hands of the lender, and since the seeurity under conditions of the neW price level may not be worth the value of the loan, the lender often loses. In the United States of America following the drastic slump of 1920, the land mortgage companies and banks found themselves possessing more land than they could handle or sell with the result that they had to underwrite great losses in the princiPals of their loans, and farms could be bought from mortgage comranies iu some of the best agricultural districts by farmers of good reputation at very loW prices and with practically no down payments. A situation such as this is drastic even in America where land does not hold the same significance to the whole social structure as it does in a purely agricultural country, auch as those to be found in Asia. In a purely agricultural country, where there are no great industrial oprortunities for the social classes, and where the attach- ment of a peasant to his land and to his community is very great, such a situation oftan becomes tragic. EVOLUTION OF CREDIT FACILITIES. In a commercialized economy definite credit institutions appear. These credit institutions generally follow some order of appearance. Firat, there are unregulated private lenders oPerating from household to household with no nearby domicile of their own. In many cases, these money-lenders travel periodically from village to village. In Siam they often go by boat in the srring and during the harvest seasons. In other cases there are local residents doing the buainess of money lending from their domiciles. The money-lender oftentimea goes into the business of buying and selling the important commer cialized agricultural Product, becanse that is the aurest guarantae of repayment of the loan. Further, he often becomes a merchant furniahing aupplies or credit rather than money. Then the three businesaea----lending money, marketing the agricultural prodnct and furnishing supplies to the farmer----become very confused so that an observer cannot tell whether the lender secures the agricultural crop for marketing to secure repayment of the loan or the middleman lends the money to the cultivator in order to be able to have the croP for marketing or the merchant sells goods to buy padi or <1?vice>1 <1versa.>1 Iu most cases it is a confusion of tWo or more reasons. Under conditions such as those described above, the agricultural industry is greatly handicarPed. First of all, interest rates are <1vcry>1 high even with the best security and, second, the middleman so con- fuses his return on his loans and his profits from the other businesses that the marketing and merchandising systems become very uneconomic. Since the middleman has a hold upon the cultivator, he can sometimes grade the agricultural rroduct as he chooses and the whole agricultural industry operates urou an inefficient basis. This conditiou haprens in most countries which change rapidly from a self-sufficing agrieultnre to a commercialized economy. It also haPpens in new countries which are developing raridly, such as the western Part of the United States of America during the past century or in some sections of the northwestern Canadian rrovinces today. The second stage in agricultural credit, which arises in many countries, is that of separate credit institutions. These generally develop through public effort, particulary those of the governments. In nearly all countries the governments at least regulate the develor- ment of the credit institutions and supervise them after they are developed. The purposes of these new credit institutions are numerous. First, they seek to lower the interest rates in aceordance with the type of security offered by the cultivator. Second,they seek to lower these rates of interest by increasing the <1supply>1 of funds available for loaning, either by finding newer sources for loans or by promoting the raPidity of circulation of surrlus funds from those who have an excess to those who need loans in their businesses. Third, they attempt to separate the marketing and credit institutions so that credit iu itself does not make the marketing-system inefficient. And, fourth, the aim is to build institutions of a stable nature and sufficiently near the cultivator so that relationships between the cnltivator and the lending institntion become more stable, more per- sonal, in a purely business sense, and more conductive to the economic and social interests and development of the cultivator. The credit institutions thns seek to educate the cultivator about credit and its economic nses. THE POSITION OF SIAM TODAY. The Siam of today haa two areas of almost pure aelf-sufficing agriculture, the South and the Northeast, one area of almOst pure commercial ecOnomy, the Central division, and one area Partly self- sufficing and partly commercialized----the circle of Bayab. Its credit institutions in the central and northern aections are still in the first stage of commercial develorment----that Of the travelling padi buyer or merchant whO lends money to cultivators at high interest rates, regardlesa of security. Of course, the districts or farmers with better security acquire loans for leas than those without security, but the average rates of interest are seldom less than 20 rer cent and are nearly always nearer 30 per cent even in the best districts aud among the farmers with good seeurity. There are no agricultural credit institutions of the banking sort with per- manent buildings and close and neighborly, in a bnsiness aense, relationships betWeen borrower and lender. The creditor----either Chinese or Siamese----in inany casea does the marketing of the padi. Oftentimes he is present at the threshing and oftentimes he dictates the grade and the price, and even the measuring instrumenta for the rice. Considering the fact that the buyer oftentimea handles the rice, the <1real cost of credit to Siamese cult-ivators cannot be deter->1 <1mined very exactly.>1 The creditor sometimes furnishes supplies in the shape of food and clothing to the cultivator and the economic system becomes more confused because the profits of merchandising, the profits of money lending and the profita of marketing the crop, where these exist, merge together. A peasaut sometimes does not knoW just where he stauds or what he pays for geods, what he pays for credit or what he aecures for his rice. The situation is almost identical with the credit aystem in the southern section of the United States among the small cottou and tobacco cultivators----aad as difficult to remedy. The only safeguard which some cultivator have at present in the competition which exists to some extent among the middlemen and his own refusal to produce rice for sale when the system becomes too heavy and burden upon him. This furnishes very wide limits for inefficiencies in the economic system. This pre- sent year mauy of the farmers, particularly in the worst districts, may have to withdraw from rice cultivation on a commercial scale. This naturally tends to reduce the social income of the Siamese peorle and the income of the State from land taxation. The situation is further comPlicated by the fact that Siamese farmers in many of the districts have just made the transfer from the self-sufficing cconomy to the commercialized economy during the economy to the commercialized economy many Of the old habits- and attitudes regarding the repayment of loans. As a result the farmer---- and the money-lender----permit the loans to carry on fromn year to year, without serious payments other than the interest. Thus the decline in agricultural prices caught many of the peasants unrrepared. They had let gOod years go by without repaying loans. Rice drop- ped in value, and in terms of purchasing power many of the loans increased tremendously. Thus the transfer of securities---lands---- from the borrower to the lender promises to be heavy during the next five to fifteen years. statistical data collected for this section. These show that at the end of B. E. 2473, the average country family owed the following amounts :---- During the year loans increased more than the beginning of the year, in spite of some repayments by the following amounts :---- Center 27 Baht Per family Northeast 2 Baht per family Not all the families had loans. FOr every 100 families in the various parts of Siam, in the aea of the:---- Center 49 families had loans; North - 18 families had loans; South 18 families had loans; Northeast 11 families had loans. Of the families which had loans, not all paid interest. For every 100 families which had loans in the sections of Siam, the following numbers raid interest :---- Center 60 paid intereat ; North 71 Paid interest ; South 41 paid interest ; Northeast 56 paid interest. These figures aPrarently show that a higher Proportion of the families who borrow money in the North Pay interest than in the Center. This is somewhat contrary to the previous statement that the people in the non-commercialized districts paid interest less often than in the commercialized districts. However, the figures misre- present the situation simply because the families in the three most important borrowing seetious of the Center that were studied, Dhanyaburi, Ayudhya and Bejraburi had a number of families who could not pay interest this year and a number of exceedingly small loans made from relatives without interest to tide over the economic depression for just this year. The earlier conclusion still holds true. Particular circnmstances are responsible for the apparent deviation in these figures. An attempt was made to determine the average interest paid by the cultivators. It was very difficult to determine average rates of interest because from 40 to 60 per cent of all borrowers in the different districts did not pay interest. In addition, soine of the interest was paid in rice so that it was hard to determine the amount of the value of the interest. If an agreement was made that a person bOrrowed 80 Baht and raid 25 tang of rice interest a year, it was difficult to decide whether the interest rate should be determined upon the value of the rice at the time that the contract was made or at the time that the contract was fulfilled and the rice paid. Further, many of the loans had not yet been repaid. Again large loans generally paid lesser rates than small loans. A large loan would reduce the rate in a community of small loans if the rate were weighcd by the amount of the loan. Further, time was lacking for any complex calculations of geometric or harmonic means. As a result, it was finally decided that the sum of all interest rates Would be secured and this amount be divided by the number of rates. These are the data presented in Tables X A follOwing. The tables also give the maximum and the minimum rates paid in the communities and the number of families who borrowed money and did not pay any interest. In general, interest rates varied enormously within a eommuni- ty and from commnnity to community. By averaging the <1rates>1 in the commuuities and averaging the average rates from community to community, it was found that the most representative rates and the average rates were approximately the same. In the districts studied the following results were secured :---- These are unweighed means of rates of interest within a con- munity and unweighed means of community rates for districts. They are also the tyPical or model rates. Those who would have used different methods should realize that the problem was very complicated, there was little time for comrutation of other rates, and that the wish was primarily for a model rate. The higher rate in the Center than in the North is due to the unusually high rate Paid by the tenants of the long Rangsit section. Otherwise, it would appear that the more commercialized sections Paid lower rates of iuterest. SIAMESE AORICULTURAL DEBT. The figures that have been collected enable an estimate of the agricultural debt of the country for the time between the settlement of the obligations paid from the rice harvest of B. E. 2473 and the commencing of borrowmg for the purposes of planting the next croP in early B. E. 2473. The method is as follows. The Circles of Udorn and Nagor Rajasitna, which constitute the area of the Northeast had a total of 627,438 dwellings according to the Census of B. E. 2472. Sometimes more than one family lived in a dwelling. It is estimated that the ropulation in the provincial cities will not account for more than 2 per cent of the dwellings and the extra families which live more than one to a dwelling. Accordingly 2 per cent is subtracted from the 627,438 dwellings which gives 614,890 dwellings. The estimate is that these 614,890 erresent families typical of those included in the study. Multi- rlying this number ljy 14, the average debt at the end of B. E. 2473, according to this study, the estimate for the debt of the Northeast at that time is 8,608,000 Baht. In a similar manner, 2 per cent of the houses and the durlicates are considered the number of families of the North that were not typical of those studied, 3 per ceut for the South (1 Per cent is added for tiu miners), and 2 per cent plus the estiinated number of families in Bangkok for the central section. These computations give the following numbers of households and estimates of the agricultural debt for the various sections at the end of B. E. 2473. This gives a total debt of the nOn-city families of Siam, before the time of debts incurred to put iu the crop of B. E. 2474, of about 143 million Baht. Of this amount the debt of the southern and the northeaatern sections may be excluded aa not being parti- cularly pressing at this time. It is possible also to exclude a half of the debt of the North and four-tenths of the debt of the central section on the grouud that it is in the hands of relatives aud friends who will not cause particular harm to come to the cultivator. Thus roughly 65 million Baht are excluded. The remainder, 78 million Baht, is the " harmful " debt of Siam. It is paying an extortionate rate of interest, and is in the hands of persons who will take the lands and securities of the country families if the interestis not paid. In the next 10 years a portion of these families will be able to settle their own affairs and a portion will go under. That is the Problem which a more efficient credit institution will face. These 78 millions of Baht are in the hands of money-lenders of all sorts. On the average, it probably pays 22 per cent interest, or an interest bill of 17,160,000 Baht a year. A credit insitution which could reduce the average interest payments to 12 rer cent per annum, would save the cultivators 7,800,000 Baht a year of interest. This 7,800,000 Baht a year would repay the principle of the poten- tially harmful debt, assuning no increased payments on account of the reduced interest rates in 10 years. It is not intended to give the impression here that credit is harmful to a society. On the cOntrary it ia not only beneficial but necessary to a eommercialized economy. This discussion is not directed at the elimination of credit but at inProving the credit facilities. With lower interest rates, each farmer could associate with his labor a greater amount of capital goods such as machinery, better plows, better fed animals, etc. The average prodnctivity of the farmers would be raised because each man would have more and better machines, plows, animals, etc., working for him. The same interest bill as Paid in Siam would give each farmer three times as much capital goods to help him rroduce in most Western countries where agricultnral interest rates average not higher than 7 or 8 per cent. On the other hand if the interest bill is lowered and the peasant does not use the greater caPital for production but rather for consumrtion, the economic system will become still morc iDefficient. This Point is of interest later when we discuss the extension of more economical credit institutions. FURTHER INFORMATION. In addition to the above information, careful questioning was done of the local officials, the farmers, the money-leuders and other informed Persons. The attempt was to find out the answers to the following geueral questions :---- 1. Why do the people in this section borrow money ? 2. What significance does merit-making at the time of entry into the priesthood or at funerals have to the borrowing of money ? 3. Where does the money coine from---that is what are the sources of credit ? 4. In general, who are the money-lenders ? 5. What types of security are used ? 6. What rates of interest are raid ? 7. How is the loan spent ? 8. HoW and when are loans repaid ? 9. Do loans have any connection with padi sales ? 10. When loans are not reraid, What action is taken ? 11. Do many of the families lose their lands through borrowing ? In the following table a rough tabulation of the data is presented for the importaut districts. These are presented in the form of typical results. These rerresent the data from 500 families with loans and the results of questions answered by approximately 200 money-lenders and local officials. The information for the families was written on the family schedule at the time of collection of information about ecCnomic matters. An official talked with the money-lenders and other informed persons and wrote down the results immediately afterwards. There ia no reason why these answers given here are not representative of the facts. These summarized results lead to the conclnsion that the credit problem of the country is to be found at present princirally in the central sections and around Chiengmai. Provincial cities in the other districts also have credit prOblems in their districts among the farmers nearest to town. Further they show clearly that the Siamese peasant is still living according to the credit habits of the == self-sufficing time and with the risks of commercial agriculture. He makes debts too ofteu for cOnsuinptive purposes rather thau for purposes of Productiou. Consequently, too much of his money which he borrows is not put to work but is consumed without adding to his income. A partial reason for this is the fact that he has no bank or place of deposit for his money. He must always keep it about his, and haVing it about him, he spends it, sometimes foolishly. This is but a par of the larger problem that the peoPle have emerged from the neighborly and insignificant credit relations of self-sufficing Agriculture to the buSiness-like relations of commerce but have not yet comPletely learued the great lesson of self-discipline necessary to success in the commercialized field. This leads to the following aud very imPortant conclusion : <1result in real harn at this .>1 The credit agency that will help the Siamese farmer is one that will teach him when to borrow and when not to borrow. 1t must teach him hoW much to borrow. It must wateli him, encourage him and guide him. It must insist that he rePays the loan as soon as possible. It must guide his expendi- tures. It must take a personal intercst in him. Obviously the only institutiou which can do this is the <1Mo-operatiue Fredit>1 <1Society.>1 Since the study made here shows the particular need for a certain type of credit institutiou which can do a service of pesonal direction and guidance for the peasant while he is learning the lessonS of self-discipline necessary for a commercial economy, the remainder of this chapter is devoted to an expausion of this idea. Obviously most of the details of expausion--and financing of-the credit institntiona will have to be developed by those who have had charge of the direction and guidance of those institutions since their incep- tion, about 15 years ago. But before further discussion, a warning ueeds to be rereated. At this time there are numerous schemes for development of credit institutions being discussed in Siam. All of these institutions will be needed eventually. All of them have their advantages. But the cultivator needs guidance at this time more than at any other time. And a loosening of credit facilities without guidance will probably lead to losses of a major nature to the peasants and to thc investors in the credit institutions. Consequently, The Co-operative Credit Societies Were first started in Sian about 15 years ago. Their baSic idea was to form groups of farmers The qualificationS of these farmers were as follows: 1. They inust all live in the same village. 2. They must Know one another well. 3. They must be persons of good rerutatiom aud not quarrelsom e. 4. Some must be able to read and write to keeP the accouuts and to mauage the business. The fariners join together and organize a Society. All land titles and certificates must be handed to the Society- and each member must agree to borrow only from the Society. Then at first each mem- ber draws enough money to Pay off- all his old debts. This money is lent to him by the Society at 12 per cent. The Society borrows it from the Siam Commercial Bank at 6 per cent. The diff-erence is used to build up the savings of the Society so that they will be able to lend some of their own money aud so as to rrerare a surrlus for losses. The Govermnent guarantees the Siam Commercial Bank againat loss. The members supervise the borrowing and the use of the loans by the other membei-s. Each is mutually resronsible for the total amouut since there is no limited resPonsibility. CouSequently each member takes au active intereat iu the society. Further, the socicties insist that each year some of the money be paid back if possible. They watch the expenditures of other membems and rermit no extravagance. At the end of B. E. 2472 (1929-30) there were 129 societies with 2,157 members. These were all in the central section around Lobburi, A yudhya, Ang-Tong, Saraburi, Bisnulok, Bichitra and Uttradit. The total working capital was l,128,000 Baht ; of which 837,000 represented loans from the Bank, 1,000 dePosits from outside public, and 290,000 surplus and savings of the Organizations. Thus a fourth of their capital was rerresented by their own savings. These organizations had made good prOgress. The farmers were beginning to use them as banks of deposit and as sources of short term operating credit. However, the possibilities of further expansion are checked by the fact that the Siam Commercial Bank is a commercial bank and probably- should not extend its credit Inuch further for this long time agricultural eredit. The further exransion is also checked by the fact that eveutually more auditors and supervisors will be needed to set up, gnide, audit, and keep the societies out of difficulty. The Government insists on constant audits and surervision by properly qualified public officials. To meet the rural credit Problem of Siam, this Present study suggests that these Credit Unions be exranded as rapidly as Possible. the effects of the depression will be felt for some years. If the economic conditions riglit themselves in one or two more seasous, it will be 10 or 15 years before all the effects were adjusted. This nieaijs that if work is begun <1now>1 to sPread these societies, the societies will have a number of years to elimiuate some Of the bad effects of the rresent crisis. It is possible to predict from failures of country banks after crises in other countries that laud foreclosures result of this depresaion will not reach their peak until 4 or 5 years from its beginning in B. E. 2473 and will not return to the normal rate until 10 or 15 years after. If the depression coutinues for Some time, as it may in Siam on account of its elose relation to the low price of silver as compared with gold in the countries where Siamese rice is sold, the great immediate field for the Credit Uniona will last longer. The importance of realizing now that the agricultural depres- sion may not pass away after a year or two of the low prices can- not be Over-estimated. The United StateS of America went through such a dePression in 19~0. It has not yet passed away in the akri- cultural diStricts. Statistics of the failures of country banka in America show that the evil effects of the depression were not felt until 4 years after the beginning of the derression. The followiug data show this:---- Years Country bank failnres in the U. S. A. Since these banks are the ones with great accounts of land mortgages or loans to farmers, they reflect the farm failures. This shows clearly that mortgage foreclosures by money-lenders in Siam may not reach a peak for several years. Thus the Co-operative Credit Institutions have several years to prepare to help the farmers and much can be done if ProPer expansion begins now. Of course, the long time field for the Credit trDion is that of expanding into regnlar deposit and loaning banks in the rural districts. The major problem of the lack of good credit institutions in rural Siam is much greater in the long run than that of the immediate increase in debts and foreclosures on account of the economic depression. So the work begun during the depression will result in great long time gains for the country. At the same time it is wise to start the work nOw with a view of adjustmentlater to insure these long time gains. These conditions are indicated because of the current feeling that the derression will only last twO or three years and that it is useless to organize more Credit Unions because it takes too long for their exransion. On the contrary, the credit part of the depresaion will last at least a dozen years. Further any uuwise steps at this time in the too rapid development aud expansion of credit institu- tions may result, as it has done in other countries under the same conditions, in losses to both the Peasants and to the investors in the credit institutions, and to a set-back for the proper development of the economic life of the country which may last for a generation. Tlie problems of expansion Of the Credit Unions are as folloWs :---- 1. A source of further loana or credit. 2. Men to guide the expansion of the institntions. 3. The relatiOnships of the Government to the movement. Thp details of these problems shOuld be settled by those Who have worked with the credit institutions already developed. In general, the money should be raised eventnally from small country deposit banks in the provinces. Since these will take sonie time to develoP, other funds, such as those of the <1lVats,>1 the Postal Savings Banks and the Red Cross, which are noW in the Treasury, may be turned to this account. As the peoPle develop confidence in the deposit institutions, these will bear more and more of the burden of the movement. There is plenty of money in the rural districts of Siaui. The trOuble is that it is hidden away and not out in the channels of commerce. It is estimated that the Co-operative Credit Inatitutiona sliould take over the agriculCural debt of this country at the following rates :---- At the end of B. E. 2479,----12,000,000 Baht more than at the end of B. E. 2474. At the end of B. E. 2484,----36,090,000 Baht more than at the end Of B. E. 2474. At the end of B. E. 2b89, all outstanding debC in the com- niercialized farming districts not carried by relatives and neighbors. By B. E. 2490 interest rates should be reduced to 8 or 9 rer cent and a definite country bauking systems should be in operation. Men to guide this work can be trained by the present force Who have developed the work thus far. Training peOple for this Work is very important. There is no history which is aa full of failures on account of untrained and insincere employees as that of credit inatitntions. The aucceSa of the credit inatitutions lies primarily with tlie inSpectora. The societiea ahould eventually become small village banka of de&ait in tha provincea. Thia may be developed by the men trained in the coopBrstive movemBnt. These amall bauka of depoait ahould be Organized at the very first intO a national system by a eentral bank at Bangkok. Siainese who are trained in foreign banks, pro- bably some of them with foreign training, should be Pressed into service. However, one Princirle to bc remembered at all times is this <1integrity and judament>1 of <1the employeps.>1 With this in mind, the selectiou of officials should be very rigid. These dePosit banks should be for two purposes---to furnish savings, money changing and checking iustitutions to the community. At first they should be permitted to lend only through the co-oPera- tive union or through the ceutral bank at Bangkok. This central bank may lend a Part to other credit unions but a part of the funds should be kept in uegotiable secnrities at all times. Later, after some years of exrerience the better managed banks should be per- mitted to make unsupervised loans. In most countries, the Govermnent bears only a snrervisory relationship to credit institntions. The Government audits aud regulates the credit institutions. That shonld be the aim in Siam. But during the present time of national emergency, and in order to develoP a system of national credit institutions, the Government will probably have to go further than auditing and supervising. However, the aim shonld be for the withdrawal of the Governmeut from all but the supervising and regulating end of the work as sOon as the institution is well established. By B. E. 2490, the Govermnent shonld have with- drawn from any function but the auditing and supervising. Further, considering the inadequate knowledge of the natui-e of credit and its uses by the Siamese country reople, the Government, the co-operative credit institutions and the local banks should co-orerate in an educa- tional thrift campaign among the country school children. The Government should Plan to start this educational program immedia- tely through the post Office Savings Banks. This educational program is extremely important. The need for the greater development of such institutions and for the greater development of thrift was recognized by King Rama VI when he established these savings banka. The Siamese country people have no rlace to keep funds other than these institutions. Funds collected about the homes merely incite theft or are lOst through fires and accidents. As a result, they tend to srend their money as soon as possible, either wastefully or through the rnrchase of extra land or animals. In the time of a crisis they have no money to pay the taxes because they cannot keep savings. If they try to sell lands ;" or animals, there are no buyers because the other persons must also use what little money they have to ray their taxes. As a result, a depression in Siam finds many families unable to ray their taxes. In countries with well develoPed credit and savings institutions, the country People withdraw enough money to pay the taxes. In America where the <1Xuko>1 system of land taxation is generally prevalent, the country Peorle must pay taxes in good years an(l had. They have credit and savings institutions and can do it. However, it is difficult to change the habits of adults. It would seem wise at this time to begin an educational campaign among the children, through the DePartment of Education, to bring about a wider usage of savings institutions and a greater knowledge of the general nature of credit and its uaes. attention. The problem is of economic significance in three particular asrects. That of pressure of population is a factor in forcing or limiting economic adjustments ; that of health in economic efficieucy ; and that of the cost of medical service considering returns received by the PeoPle. The question of population in relation to health has received a great deal of consideration in this country. Since the net results of this present study show that there is <1st~ll arcat u?ider->1 arcas,>1 the factors of ropulation and health are reviewed in detail following. Sian is a tropical and semi-tropical country. Unfortunately, from the standl)oint of health, its semi-tropical section is sOmewhat mountainous and is all area where practically the entire population is sick with chronic malaria or with aflictions following attacks. On account of the nature of tropical growth in the southern sections and of the great amount of malaria in the cooler sectious of the North, under-Population has become a elironic problem in this country- Under-Populatiou is a relative term. It depends entirely uron the Productive capacity of natural resources, uron the industrial technique of the people and upon the standards of living of the peorle. A country of great, natural resources can maintain more population than another with less; a country with an improved agricultural or iudustrial technique can maintain a larger populatiou than a country withOut such a developed technique. And finally the ratio between the standards of consuinption and the standards of liviug has a pearing upon the ropulation. The Siamese people livein a land of great agricnltural resources. In spite of the fact that there is practically no seed selection performed by the Siameso agriculturalist (other than to keer the glutinous and nonglutinous rice seeds separate or to seParate the red rice seed from the comninon ones). Yet Siamese rice has claiined a premium in all of the world inarkets. This is probably due to the nature of the Siaiuese soil, to their transPlanting technique, and to a natural selection of seed,---just why is not clearly known. While there have been some receut changes due to nefarious merchandising practices of inixing rice and selling it for pure Siamese i-ice and to the greater development of seed selection in some other countries, in the main this statement is still true. There are vast areas in this country capable of producing excellent wheat, coffee, cotton and tobacco, which are not yet ex- ploited. The rubber industry in Southern Siam is not yet developed as it might be. Great areas of tiu-ore are as yet unworked. Practically uothing has been done as yet to improve the quality or productivity of the many varieties of fruits and cocoauuts, which grow practically wild in this country. Siam is truly a country cf great natural resources. The sugar industry, other than that of refining the juice of the sugar palm, is practically undeveloped. The industrial technique (nsing this term to cover the agricultural technidue and the inethods for economic exploitation) is very crude. The reason for this lies, to a great extent, in the fact that there has been such a great suPply of natural resources in relationshir to the population that there has been very little stimulus among the common reople to force them to improve the production and economic technique. Other than the inethods which the Siamese learned from the Khmers in the first thousand years of the Christian era or the technique that was brought from Central Asia, there has been no great develorment of agricultural practices. The people do not yet know how to plow properly, to utilize the soil or to perform the basic operations of agriculture as they should. They do not weed the fields, nor utilize the natural mauure. The primitive chain-pump, which has been used for a great many years, to prerare irrigate the lands for rice-growing in the early months which precede the short season of the heavy downpour of rain, is of Chinese origin, namely <1'Rahat'.>1 This is made of wood. It is usnally run by human labor, and works very slowly and ineffi- ciently. It has been only during the last ten years that the small motor engine for attachment to this rumr was introduced. This works much faster and the number in use is increasing raridly. Consequently the country has great possibilities for sustaining a much higher population than at present, even if all of the lands available for agriculture were now under cultivation. 'The standard of living of these people is already above that to be found elsewhere in the orient and in other sections of the tropics. It is better in both an economic and in a sriritual way. Famines are seldom known and these are of minor significance. The average cash income or the average value of their standard of living, including both cash income and income in goods direct from nature, is probably more than twice as great as the average for Iudia or China. The people are well off. Consequently, they do not face the problem of the pressure of population upon natural resources as a factor in reducing the standard of living. This is very important for the simple reason that the advocates of under-population in the West have given the impression everywhere that the Asiatic Peoples are so poor that they cannot live efficiently. As a matter of fact, as far as Southeastern Asia is concerned, no statement could be farther from the truth. The people of Siam also have a high spiritual or non-material standard of living. The exposing of children, the sale of children, the consecration of female children as temple prostitutes, child- marriage, crude and unhuman rractices, all these and similar behaviors which might be considered as evidence of a low spiritual standard of living are not to be found among the Siamese. On the other hand, the Siamese have a high development of art, sculpture, silver work, niello work, silk and cotton weaving, lacquer work and all of the other practices considered important to artistic life. Even in the moat primitive communities, one can find a door-plate, a dish, a piece of Weaving, a temPle of a carved end----gate of a bullock cart Which may be justly called a real work of art. Considering the general oriental situation, the standard of living in this country is about as high as cau be maintained at present. The evidence of underporulatiOn in this conntry may be cited as follows. There is some good rice land as yet uncutivated. In every area were there need for such, the productivity could bc improved, generally by half or a whole, even by the nse of the simrler improved methods of agriculture. The introduction of modern technique for seed selection, plant breeding and the utilization of the surface of the soil could do as much or more in most communities. The older settled areas of the country, particularly around the old ruined cities, all show evidences of greater cultivation formerly than is now being Practised. Only the best lands are being cultivated ; the margin of agricultural development is not pushed back iuto the less valuable lands. In the Klong Rangsit section the average farm is about 100 rai of rice land Per houSehold. There is practically no develOpmeut of a dry agriculture to supplement rice Productiou. There are only 57 persons per square mile of territory including Bangkok population. Omiting Bangkok, there are ouly 53 per square mile. The evil iubuences of under-population have been many. With the exception of the fact that it is easier to make a living here than in most oriental countries and that the incomes are sOmewhat higher than for the rest of Asia, there is no reason to believe that the standards of living of the people have gained anything from under- roPulation in itself. The people have more land resonrces but these are not used. Furthermore, the peorlc are not sufficient in number to support many iustitutions which might be done by community efforts in much poorer, but more densely populated, communities. Throughout the history of this country, there has been this same trouble of underpopulation. Practically every province has a settle- ment or two of Siamese peoPles of diffierent dialects brought in as hostages of war to till the vacant lands and who have now attached themselves to the soil in these localities. However, the chief defect of under-population is that there is no stimulus leading to economic progress or to improved methods in agriculture. 228 These and other considerations lead to the very evident conclu- sion that the under-population in Siam requires health work rather than the danger of over-population limiting it. CAUSES OR UNDERI'OPULATION. is this nnder-population to be found in Siam? Isit . because of a low birth rate? Is it because of a high death rate? The following section attempts to answer these questions. The travels and investigations covered all of Siam from Naradhivas, Trang and Bhuket in the South to Chiengrai in the North and to the Mekong on the East. Short excursions were made into nearby lands. As far as can be told, mueh of the southeastern rart of Asia is relatively under-populated. It is not so much a Siamese problem as it is a problem of this section of Asia. All of these areas have a primitive agricultural technique and much vacant land. In other words, the problem of under-population is general in this section of Asia, with the exception of a few river valleys in the tide-water area and arouud one or two large cities. In the tin-mining sections of Siam, there is more vacant land that was once given to rice cultivation than there is now under cultivation. The famners rrefer to work at mining for tin rather than to cnltivate the fields. Economically they are right because tin pays more bnt the rice lands are still there. In a lesser degree the same situation prevails everywhere in the section of the country. The next question is that of the relationshir of the birth-rate to this under-porulation. It was of particular interest to find if under-population existed because of birth-control, or practices of delayed marriage, which would result the same. Further, the development of an extra-famly sex life miglt be responsible fOr this under-population. The srread of venereal diseases might also achieve a sort of a crude form of birth-control. The results are based on careful physical examinations of about ten thousand people, located in groups of two hundred fifty in forty representative areas of territory. These examinations were conducted by a well- qualified staff of governmental physicians assisted from time to time 230 by a nnmber Of foreign physicians of the American Prcsbyteriau Mission. The results of the investigation may be snmmarized as follows. First of all, the birth rate among the people does not seem to be under human control. they not know about birth-control nor practiee any form to amy- extent. As to age of marriage, it was found that most of the people neither marry too carly nor delay their marriage to such a late age that it would have any er-ecC uroii the birth-rate. Arnong all of the population exeept the Mohamme dans in the South, the average age of marriagc for a man ranged from to 25 and for a girl from to 21 In the South,amongthc Mohammedans, betrothals take place much earlier, but very seldoiu is the marriage consumaterl until after adolescencc. Consequently there was very little evidone to indicate age of marriage has had anything to with the under-rorulation which exists in this whole area. In the same way it was found that venereal disease could not explain it. Outside of the market places there is practically to venereal disease in the country. Either the peorle have never had any such disease or the germ strains have worn themselves out or have beem conquercd by natnral selectiom or by native medicines. In this case exceptions must be made for the large market blaces and the rort cities. rlaces with comaercialized prostitntion anl their mobile rorulatioms ignorant of the first laws of hygien, probably about as mech infected as the rural districts are free from this diseasc. Fnrthernore, in the coumry districts, the uneler-rolblation could not be explained by any great deelorment of extra-family sex-life. The family mores are very rigid. Of comrse eery district has its exceptions but in the far isolated districts, such sex inter- course among the younger people generally leads to marriage. 1n the ceutral valley of the <1MILao Phya>1 any advances made to a female member of a family lead almost invariably to trouble. There was less than one per cent of polygamy so this could not have explained the matter. Again it is tO be noted that the port cities and to Some 231 extent the larger provincial cities are exceptions to these conclusious. <1The conclusion was finally reached that the great cause of under- population in this country must be almost entirely in the circum- stafnces which lead to a high death-rate.>1 THE DEATH-RATE. In this study four or five types of data were gathered in an attempt to understand the health conditions of the pcorle and the high death-rate. Nearly all the members of two thousand families in forty groups of fifty (9248 persons) were examined carefully in a reclining position by competent rhysicians, trained in Western schools and by Western methods. These examinations were supervised very carefully. In addition, most of the school children in the villages were examined. Furthermore, the birth and death statements as recorded by the local officials in the forty communes were examined earefully by these same physicians. The local househOlders were asked to describe the symptoms which preceded death and a canse was assigned to each death certificate by the physicians. All of deaths ' had eccured under the eyes of these reorle and in their homes during periods from one to eighteen months preceding the surley. Furthermore, as competent students of oriental health have known for some time, the average villager knoWs the names of the more common diseases. A comanon epidemic disease which has been kill- ing off a reople for generations soou becOmes known and recognized, so that a villager can tell you if a relative died from small-pox or plague or cholera or malaria or snake-bite or accident. The physicians were fairly successful in securing a reasonable accuracy of cause of death fOr each of these certificates. In additiOn tO this, each head of honsehOld was asked to tell the number of children that had died in his household, to give the age at health and to describe the symptoms at death. All of this information was tabnlated and analyzed very carefully. In some cases the peOple were divided into economic grouPs and their separate , death-rates and physical disabilities were studied. The basic tables of infOrmation are at the end of this chapter. No claims as to the specious ; 252 accuracy of these data are made. Further they should have been analyzed by additional types of tabulations, as for instance the num- ber of rersons with one defect, two defects, etc. Age and sex tables should have been made. The spleen indices should have been tabulated into au age frequency table showing the amonnt of enlargement. The defects of the income groups should have been studied in more detail. This was done for the 8 villages of the Northeast in prepar-a- tion of a paper for the International Population Congress at Rome (see <1Proceedings>1 of this Congress, 1931). The general conclusions given here are based on exPeriehce with the people and the numerous tabulations rresented in the appendix to this chapter. Al that can be said is that, under the circuinstances, as much was done as was possible and that was ; done as earefully as possibly. Physical diagnosis is sometimes very difficult. It is hoped that these are not completely wrong. In extenua- tion, it may be said that the methods used in the examination were the same as those used by the best of physical examinations and under hospital circumstances without the use of laboratory technique. ,SUMMARY HEALTH AND DEATH-RATE. 1n general, it is thought that the data and analyses given at the end of this charter, plus observation of conditions lead to a ; snbstautiation of the following conclusions. vaccination for small-pox which is done in the different areas accord- ing to a Government program for comrlete vaccination and also dur- ing the time of eridemics, the death-rate is mactically unchecked by the use of Western medicines. Fifty per cent of the people use no medical treatment except to rest and to take a few local herbs aud teas, all of which probably have little curative value. More than forty-nine Per cent of the remaiuing fifty secure medical remedies from native medicine vendors, a eombination of Siamese, Chinese and Indian. Probably sOme of these medicines have a little value 255 but even this is very doubtful. Some of these are the kind of mediciue vendors who sell concoctions made of pulverized tiger paws snake skins, skeletons of strange looking sea animals and Other un- nsual materials. Their shops are filled with such things and they make there pills by combining a little bit of everything. With all due respect to native medicine, it is extremely doubtful if it does much more than make the persOn believe that he is going to recover. Less than one per cent of the people secure Western medical - treatment, primcipally through the free gift of the Government through its hospitals and clinics and of the medical missionaries. Even vacciuation for small-pox is handicarped by facilities for communication. If an ePidemic breaks out in a particular commnnity not yet vaccinated, it generally takes some days before a message can reach the office of the Medical Officer of the Province and before he can get to the reople with vaccines. other than the introduction of medical chests into some Of the Diistrict offices <1Amphur>1 and the recent sale of quinine and cholera medicine at cost to the local officials, there is nothing in rural Siam to check the death-rate already deseribed above. <1second conclusion concenin the death-rate in Siam is>1 <1that it moves by cycles in the various communities.>1 Epidemics oceur from time to time under favorable conditions and these breed a sort of natural immunity among the people. Five or ten years later conditions are again favorable for an eridemic because a new crop of children has arpeared and much of the old immunity has disappeared. Then a neW epidemic springs np. The same cycle repeats itself time and time again. In some sections and for some diseases however, the conditions of infection are always present and : certain diseases ordinarily considered eridemic become endemic--that is every one has the disease and if having it onee does not breed a life-time immunity, he has the disease many times. 234 dysenteries and intestinal parasites are always prevalent. of course the rainy season may clear up the water supply for a while and reduce the amonnt of infection but the next dry ' season always bringa it back again. There is only one cure used generally for the dysenteries of Siam and that is natural immunity. The reorle have had these dysenteries so long that there is a high proportion of immunity. The attacks are not so severe. On the other hand, the belief in natural immunity has been over-worked as a form of health protectiom to these peorle. In srite of a high natural immunity the great mass of People either have dysenteries or histories of such. Since these diseascs run unchecked throughout the population, the adLilt individual is generally one whose body recovered before succumbing to other diseases. :That is adults will die as frequently from a single attack of malaria as will children. The adult has greater mass of body and greater resistance hower. Among the adticts, the deaths often come from accumulation of simrle diseases and their residues. The Siamese people possess all =. of the discascs known to man. However, the unusual diseases do not Tere Peo le lead out-of-door . the work in the blazm sunshine with very little covering above the waist or below the knee If it were not for the common infectious diseases, they Would masses of ordinary diseases throngh which everyone must go are not treated at all. Fach now parasite makes the recuperative glands more abnorjnal until their bodies gradually become incapable of further adartation and the next disease, even though only a mild one, will sometimes carry them off In the malarial districts, practically all of the peorle have some enlargement of spleens. Some 256 serious cases seem to have enlarged livers. In the districts where framboesia Yaws is prevalent most of the people have enlarged ePitrochlear glands. Nothing is ever eompletely eliminated from their systems and people simply get better aud go back to work. The same thing aprlies to hosts of intestinal parasites. These intestinal parasites may be said to have infected every bit of water in this Kingdom excePt the water supply of Bangkok. The saving faetor iu the lives of the young children is that they are generally breast-fed, at least until a younger brother or sister interferes with these arrangements. They are fairly well watched and taken care of until the solid time. when the transfer from a milk diet, rich in proteins, to a rice diet, with little or no protein, causes a great deal of suffering. Those who do live over the interval have enlarged abdomens which do not retreat until seven or eight years of age. Following this period come the worms and intestinal parasites and the possibilities of malarial infection, which further eularge the abdomenal cavity. As a result neither the figure nor the skin of most of the country people is particularly attractive. If the skin is not affected by yaws, it is generally attacked by some other parasites which give it irregular pigmentation. <1All of these details show that the death-rate is not only>1 <1unchecked among the people but it is cumulative.>1 The people die in many cases because they have never completely recovered from many earlier diseases and the resultant eonditions. Consequently it is found that a little work of a medical nature to reduce the incidenee of the more simple diseases has a cumulative effect npon the death- rate more than could be accounted for by that disease itself. In most villages the rorulation is growing more rapidly than before inspite of the fact that very little medicine other than quinine and a few simple remedies have been sent to the people. The data in Chapter II Table II A show the changes in living descendants over two generations of reople----a time of approximately forty years. Excert in the epidemic villages and the malarial region of the far north, the table shows a remarkable increase. Yet these communities 236 in most cases have not seen a Western type of doctor before. Since the time of measurement was much greater than the cycles of all of the common epidemics, the present rapid increase of hopulation in Siam ( 1.9 pcr cent more than the death-rate per year) can only be explained by the fact that a little Western medicine even though applied crudely, has a cumulative effect in restraining the death-rate from all diseases by building up the bodies of the people. <1Thus the primary medical problem of Siam is not as com->1 <1plicated as many have been led to believe.>1 Its major details are to educate the people to use, first of all, a good home pharmacology and second to educate them in the prorer treatments for epidemic diseases such as malaria, yaws, and dysenteries. In addition, they should be tanght "first aid" and how to prorerly wean children from a milk diet to a bulky rice diet. In addition, the great mass of people, or at least a high proportion of them, have many common but dangerous diseases of the eyes, such as trachoma and conjunctivitis. For these, in the early stages of the infection, some of the simple medicines will do wonders. Other than this, the medical rroblem is the same here as in other countries. <1But considering the fact that the great>1 <1mass of the people are weakened or killed by these common well->1 <1recognized diseases before they have a chance to acquire the others,>1 <1it would seem that the first step should be to attack these simple and>1 <1commom diseases.>1 THE COST OF MEDICAL CARE. Some information was gathered as to the total amount of money spent for medical care. In general, it averaged 5.90 Baht Per family in the Center, 2.80 in the North, 2.70 in the South and 1.60 in the Northeast. Of the met spendable income of country people (cash incomes minus farming coats, taxes and interest) between two and three per cent is spent for health (native medicine), and birth. The data are tabulated below. 237 COST OF NATIVE MEDICINE AND CARE- The chief conclusion to be reached from these tables is that money spent for native medicine forms a fairly large sum (about 6,500,000 Baht a year). The average birth in Central Siam costs 4 Baht, in the North and Northeast 1 Baht and in the South 3 Baht, and the average cost for the funeral is 69 Baht for the Center, 26 Baht for the North, 17 Baht for the South and 10 Baht for the Northeast, as shown in the tables appended to this chapter. This sum includes expenses concerning the corpse, merit making and cremation as well. 238 The evident conclusion is that the great competing factor with Western medicine is native medicine. The real health budget of the Siamese peorle may be increased almost 7 million Baht a year if the service of better trained physiciaus can be secured and the country peoPle are educated to speend the money for them that now goes to native quacks. The above analysis show the bases of a medical biogram for Siam. Before going further it is necessary to consider the limitations to good medical treatment in Siam. These are two in number. There are very few Western doctors in Siam----only in the Military Service, in the Department of Public Health, in teaching, in the hosritals, in the Immigration Service and in private practice in Bangkok. Furthermore, the people cannot afford to pay very much for Western medical treatment unless they give up native medicines. The Government cannot give them Western medical treatment free of charge because it can only spend what it raises by taxes, and the People cannot afford to ray taxes for service of this sort in addition to what they now spend. The Westerner with a medical education who comes into Siam expects to practise medicine in the city of Bangkok. None of them other than Mission doctors have a practice out of Bangkok. The Siamese who was trained in medicine abroad exrects an iucome of in Bangkok. A Siamese with a M. B. degree from the Medical College of Bangkok expects 160 to 220 Baht per month. He can make this amount at present only in Bangkok or in governmental service. The semi-official hospitals are included with governmental service. The country people secure good medical treatment only from the Government or from the Missions. As a rule it is given to them free of charge or for a nominal sum. The chief persons who pay for the use of the hospitals in the provincial cities are the officials 239 and the well-to-do traders. The Government about a year ago rerorted medical officers in forty-five of the seventy-nine provinces. The Missions have hospitals in only ten towns. In 1930 the Mission hospitals outside of Bangkok treated less than 20,000 patients. At the present time new doctors are being graduated from Chulalong- kara University at the rate of about twenty a year. Even if the people can afford to ray for Western medical treatment, it will be at least 400 years at the present rate of production, before there were enough physicians to carry on the work. Even if the local output of the Government Medical College werc doubled, it would still be long before the supply would suffice. At present the Siamese cannot afford to pay for Western medical treatment. What he eau afford for health is going to the local native doctors. If the cash incomes are reduced greatly by the depression, the Siamese people will be less able to pay for good medical treat- ment. Furthermore, the local native medicine men know the people very well and can get them to spend money where a doctor educated in modern methods cannot. Consequently, the couclusion is forced that unless some new system of furnishing medical treat- ment to the people is developed, most of these people will never have any of the comforts of scientific medicine. A SUGGESTED REMEDY. On the basis of the above facts and conclusions it seems that the Siamese country people cannot rarticipate in the benefits of Western or "Scientific" medieine nor control the problem of under-population which has dominated this section of Asia since time immemorial, unless a new system of distribution of medical treatment is evolved. It is not suggested that the Present system is wrong. It is just not sufficient nor can the couutry people afford to use the doctors. Siam needs all the good physicians it can get. But in addition, some- thing else ia needed----a country system. Let the hospitals and the university turn out good physicians as rapidly as possible, A further 240 system is needed. It may be called the <1Junior Doctor System.>1 The principles for this system are given following. JUNIOR DOCTOR SYSTEM. In essence the Principles of this may be suggested as follows :---- First, the cost of training of medical men should be reduced ; second, the time of training should be reduced; third, the men should be trained in the vernacular through a vernaeular medical literature rather than through the process of long years spent in learning a foreign tongue; fourth, the men should be trained to handle all of the simple diseases which affect these people. However, the treatment of complicated diseases and the use of complicated technique should be regulated. Next, they should be sent out to the country districts and placed in private practice as rapidly as possible. They should be encouraged to run drug stores or medical vending travelling boats and carts or automobile trucks, and to sell prescribed and tested remediea for typical diseases. These men should be backed up by a large number of midwives, trained by the same simple method, con- trolled by the same rigid restrictions and sent out after a year's training to their own villages to treat the people. These midwives should be placed in private practice too, as rapidly as possible. The quickest way to reduce the cost of training the medical men should be to take them by the time they have finished the sixth or eighth <1Matayom>1 in school and give them a direct education without any preliminary training. They should go into hospitals for a Period of approximately two years and learn the com- Plete hosrital technique for a nurse. During this time they should have regular classes in Western medicine, at least the simplest drugs, under the supervision of well-trained Siamese or foreign doctors, who speak the vernacular Siamese. The medical books from which they are to be examined should be translated into Siamese as rapidly as possible. The men should be taught how to use all but the dangerous drugs. They should be taught to diagnose all of the simple diseases and to treat them. They should be taught " first aid". When they finish, they should be given an examination and 241 the title of <1Junior Doctor.>1 Then they should be expected to return to their own districts and start stationary or traveling dispensaries and gradually begin to develop a native Siamese medical treatment crossed with the Western medicine which will really heal the people. Occasionally they should be brought back to the hospitals for further training and for further examination. Those who have turned out to be misfits and failures should be eliminated at this time. At first they can be subsidized by a small amount per month and an initial supply of medicines can be given to them on credit. However, the subaidy ahould eventually disappear in order that these people should be encouraged in the work by the incentive of private gain. Furthermore, they should be expected to repay the Government for the supply of medicines which they were given at the start. In a similar way, a large supply of female doctors and midwives should be provided. These persons ahould specialize particularly in child-birth and in the problems of diet at the time of weaning. About four regional hoapitals should supply theae persons. There should be one hospital for training the <1Junior Doctors>1 in the North, one in the Northeast, one in the Center and one in the South. There should also be a hospital for training midwives in each of these districts. The students should be trained aa near home as possible in order to prevent them from being spoiled or harmed for country practice through contact with the city. These students should go back to their home districts and live on about the same standards of living as au <1Amphur>1 clerk or a <1Palat Amphur.>1 On the average, they should not exrect an income of more than 300 Baht per year, after they have paid for medicines and the cost of the business. Some will do better and some will do worse. Their cost of living will not be materially higher than that of the country families because they will participate in the homestead rights of their villages. Most of them will inherit or purchase a little land and their families will grow the necessary rice for food. In spite of the fact that they will only have a cash income of about 300 Baht per year yet they would soon be among the uprer classes of the villages. Furthermore, they would be able to receive callers at their home 242 offees for as low as twenty-five stang a treatment and make visits to the homes of villagers for as low as fifty stang a treatment. Thcy should be able to sell quinine, worm pills, laxatives, disinfectants, calomel, compounds for the treatment of yaws, remedies for the treatment of dysenteries and all of the common medicines at twenty- five or thirty per cent increase ou the price at which the Government would supply it to them. During the dry season of the year, they should be able to diseases and hold classes for the education and treatment of these pcople. For instance, if they live in a malarial section, they should go around and educate the peoPle about malaria, and get them to use quinine until their srleens are reduced to normal size. Furthermore, in the yaws section of country, campaigns can soon remedy most of the active cases. Later, the people will begin to call on these doctors when they get sick. These medical officers or <1Junior Doctors>1 should be able to replace the local village doctors as quickly as possible. These vilage doctors or <1Baedya Tambol>1 as they are called,are entirely untrained in anything except in native medicine of the crudest sort. These <1Junior Doctors>1 can be backed up by the provincial medical officers and by the regional hospital doctors. All cases of serious disease should be reported at once to the properly qualified doctor. The Junior Doctor would be prohibited by law and by constant supervision from any surgery, use of anesthetics, harmful drugs and probably some other dangerous Practices. In spite of this they possibly might kill a few persons unnecessarily, but the few they would kill would be nothing to the thousands of lives that they would save, if they could persuade the Siamese reople to use a few Western remedies, from worm medicines to an arsenic salt for yaws. It is either a question of this or nothing. Anything more exrensive than this cannot be given to the masses of the Siamese people for a long time to come. The ordinary Siamese who goes to a medical school will not live in a Siamese village, much less practice medicine on 300 Baht or less a year. Either the Siamese must be left and will be left in the hands of the quacks and suffer from 243 depopulation, high death-rates, mending misery and have a population physically marred by the scars of numerous diseases or the country will have to turn to something like this. At the preseut time two policies are prevalent in Siam, ona for the giving to the People at once the best of medical treatment, and the other, the policy of the Department of Public Health which is simply trying to educate the country people to use good medicines. The Department has put a bottle of cholera medicine in every village at an expense of 20,000 Baht to the Government and have instructed the village headman to give a little of it to every one who reports a case of loose bowels. That is a very wonderful piece of work. How- ever most of these country peoPle know so little about medicine that when one is holding a health clinic, one has to make them take the first doae at the time in order to be sure that they will take the second doae right. And as is well-known by experience, that is no guarantee that they will take a second dose at all. The Public Health Department has also tried to have every village headman buy quinine at cost price from the Government and sell it at a little more to his People who have malaria. That, too, is a very excellent piece of work. In the case of quinine for malaria, however the insufficiency of the present system of distribution through the Pu-Yai-Ban and kamnan is very evident. The sick Person if he takes quimine at all, doea not continue after the end of fever. Consequently the parasites are never driven from his blood. However, it would seem after this comprehensive study of the medical rroblema of Siam that the uneducated village headman is not capable by himaslf of becoming a competent village doctor even for malaria and dyaentery only. What the Siamese People really need is the beat that they can afford and the best that they can afford has been outlined in the previoua sections of this work. In twenty years from now, with a greater population, a better agricul- ture and improved economic conditions, they can afford better doctors By that time the hospitals can begin to raise their standards and in fifty years from now these country people will be surporting, it is to be hoped, a medical treatment not inferior to that found in the 244 country districts of most Western countries today. By either of the other courses, it is our opinion that there will be little improvement in the next 200 years. This general Policy has been suggested before and has been rejected to the present time. In spite of its rejection as a public policy, the Department of Public Health has <1had to follow the general>1 <1principles of such a policy>1 because tbe medical officials come in con- tact with the sufferings of the people aud want to see them have some This study recommends that the creation of good physicians go on as before. These good physicians are needed badly. But the other Policy should be adopted in addition- The most common arguments against this policy are that the standards of medical treatment should be raised as high as possible and that the policy would be different from the general development in Western lands. However, the answer is that this is the way Western countries secured their present medical treatment----by an evolution of present medical treatment in each decade to something better the next. Seventy-five years ago the American in the country districts was nearly always his own doctor. Then followed the era of traveling medical men using mostly native remedies. This was followed by an improvement of the medicines handled by these local medical men. The first " scientifically trained " doctors in America were not much better than the local medicine men. In the out-of- the-way districts at present, most of the medical treatment is from the traveling medical vendors. The only difference between these and the Siamese Dative doctors is that the patent medicines they use to have more real medicine on the average than the concoctions used be the Siamese native doctors. The newspapers and the country journals have been instrumental in improving the remedies found in necessary to take the Siamese country people first from the hands of the dispensers of essences made from snake skins' tiger claws' etc into the hands of persons using a pharmacology which is of some 245 medical value. From then on, the standards may be raised as rapidly as the people can afford better treatment and as they can be educated to better treatment. It may be pointed out also that this medical standard which has been set up for Siam is considered expensive even in America. The last ten years has seen the establishment of an enormous foundation called "The Committee for the Study of the Costs of Medical Care ". In America the dissemination of medical treatment is such that it is given free to the poorer people. The rich pay heavily and can afford it. The middle class, with incomes from 81,500 to $7,500 are too prond to be medical paupers and <1too>1 poor to pay for treatment. As a result, there is a general feeling that the " middle class family is suffering". It is believed that Siam needs <1all>1 the good physicians it can secure. But the common mass of the Population should be taken from the hands of the quacks as quickly as possible. LOCAL COMMUNICATION AND HEALTH. One of the essentials for the increase of the efficiency of local health administration is the rapid transrortation of messages and news from the Province to the District and the District to the Communes. The significance of this matter can be realized only from the standpoint of the local resident whoae Person is endangered by pestilences which sometimes appear in the outlying districts in an epidemic form without much Previous visible notice. Seldom is a Kamnan more than 30 minutes from the fartherest Pu-Yai-Ban or household within the Commune. However, in some districts, the Nai Amphur is many days by walking from the Commune centers. Furthermore, the local Provincial Government towns are oftentimes farther removed. The nature of epidemics in the isolated districts is sometimes serious. Whereas au epidemic is generally preceded by certain symptoms easily discernible to the experienced physician, the ordinary epidemic appears to the average man almost as a cloudburst from a sunny sky. Oftentimes epidemics of malaria, smallpox, influenza, 246 and dysentery break forth in isolated sections with but short notice ' and before the officials can be notified and prorer physicians and medicine rushed to the village, the epidemic has gained considerable headway and extracted a large toll of lives. The development of rapid communication by telephone from the Communes to the Diatrict, and from thence to the Province and the Circle is a first step in the prevention and control of these epidemics. As soon as the Government can afford to carry out ita present plans for an administrative telephone service, this should be done. THE QUININE TREE. Malaria is a real problem in Siam. Quinine will probably have to play a large role in checking it. Yet imported quinine is expensive. The problem of making the cinchona tree native here has been suggested before. However, considering the seriousness of . the problem, it should be considered further. There is still a chance that it could be grown in the mountains of the Peninsula or in the Mountains of Bayab Circle. The mountain tribes who produce <1Meang>1 could probably be taught its culture eventually if it cau be grown. It is needed badly. CHAPTER XII. FOOD AND DIET. The first purpose of this rarticular study was to find the extent to which the Siameae people have approached the level of bare subsistence as shown by their type of diet. It is generally assumed by many in the Western countries that Asia has approached such a level very closely. The second rurrose was to find the extent to which particular food iuhibitions aud practices have brought about cases of malnutritioD. Further, a rough summary of dietary conditions pointa to possible sources of improvement in thc food snpply. Finally, with the development of commercialized agriculture, certain changes, as from home pounded to milled rice, are going ou in the rural districts. Among these latter changes, the land is being farmed more and more with the consequent possible reduction of swamps and low places as sources of fish suprly. It was hored to secure some idea of the effect of these changes upon the life of the peorle. At each of the 40 villages,three families were requested to bring their days food supply to the temple for inspection. In each ease a rich family, a moderately wealthy family and a poor family were called. The food was weighed and measured and samPles of it sent families (2,000 ) were examined carefully for dietary diseases. It was soon found that the study would have to be made by dietary analyses. First of all, it was impossible to measure the use of certain foods, particularly those consumed at infrequent intervals and those a large part of which was thrown away in the cooking or 274 eating processes. Further, in many of the districts, conditions of transportation were such that it was not considered feasible to carry scales with the party. Scales were lacking locally. Consequently the crude method of reducing families to adult equivalents by consi- dering two children equal to one adult was used. However, all the constant foods (those used daily) were measured carefully, except vegetables. The others were recorded as used in the following categories :---- THE SIAMESE DIET. The important tables summarizing the data and the chemical analyses are given at the end of this chapter. The diet of the Siamese may be summarized as follows. No milk or coffce is consumed. Most of families drink no tea, although in the northern section a form of fermented tea leaf is chewed. The basis of the diet is rice, with fish as a protein food where possible. Fruits are consumed by every family as often as possible. Vegetables are generally consumed daily, but the types vary from season to season. Areca nut and betel leaf are chewed daily and almost universally. All meat, poultry and egg products are used less than two times a month and in most cases less than once a month. Salt is used every day in the cooking, and most of the sauces nsed to give a flavour to the rice contain a high per cent of salt. Beans are oftenly used as green vegetable. The basic form of fish consumption is fermented fish or pastes (as shrimp paste) or dried salt fish. Fresh fish is eaten when available, but the season for catching fish is best during the season about October, November and December. During the rainy season the people are busy in the fields. To compensate for the lack of fresh fish during this season, preserved fish and shrimp are uaed. At 275 the beginning of the dry season, when the Water of the stream-beds is becoming low, fish is caught and the surplus is dried or fermented. The ahrimr paste is mostly bought in the market, moat of it coming from the sea. The rice consists of two kinds----glutinous and non-glutinous. The glutinous is eaten in the North and Northeast aud the non- glutinous or white rice is eaten in the South and Center. The peorle who eat glutinous rice as the "staff of life" eat a little White rice with cocoanut milk as a sweetmeat. On the other hand, in the South, glutinous rice forms a sWeetmeat and is eaten cooked with cocoanut milk. The people of the glutiuous rice territory eat more grams of rice (693) per adult per day than the people in the non-glutinous territory (553). Further, although the glutinous rice is of about the same food value, the northeru people consume more calories per day. According to our estimate, the white rice people eat about 2,000 calories Of white rice rer adult per day and the glutinous rice eaters consume about 2,500. On the other hand, the white rice people, being more wealthy and living nearer tO the canals and the sea eoast, eat more fish food. There may be differences in the size of the people, but this is doubtful. It seems principally a matter of money and the availability of the fishing resources. The people who eat the glutinous rice are far from rice mills, as a rule. So they pound the rice themselves by a system which leaves most of the Pericarp on the grain. Consequently, the pericarp gives them more phosphates and nitrates and partly compensate for the greater amount of fish and animal food eaten by the white rice eatera. Salt is eaten in what seems to be unduly large quantities, probably because of the low amount of animal food in the diet. Freah fish is seldom eaten in large quantities even by those who have the most, because they are always saving the extra fish for the seaaou of shortage and because of their developed habits of eating large quantities of rice with small amounts of fish. The low consumption of pork, poultry and beef has arisen partly out of the low cash incomes of the people and a food inhibition 276 which has arisen concerning the killing of animals. Even in places where this food inhibition has lost most of its force, or iu others where the Chinese kill the animals, the taste for an animal diet is not developed greatly, so the people still live Primarily on a rice diet. Most of the Poultry and fresh meat is consumed on holidays. A number of trends are comiug about in the diet, some of them helpful, some compensating and some dangerous. The first is the rapid change from pounded rice, with most of the pericarp still left on the grain, to the milled rice lacking most of the pericarp. This occurs practically everywhere with the change from self-sufficing to commercialized agriculture. The second is the decline of the supply of local fish due to over-fishing, to drainage and to greater cultivation of the land. The third is the devclopment of markets where fresh meat and poultry are sold, principally by the Chinese, and the gradual infiltration into the country of the habit of eating more animal food other than fish. The fourth is the substitution of forms of imported dried, smoked or salted fish to take the place of the local fresh water supply which has dwindled. These trends are dangerous to the extent that they may not compensate for each other. Milled rice without more fish and animal food is probably not a complete diet. Dried fish is probably not a compensatory food for fresh fish, providing no other fresh animal food is taken. DIET DEFICIENCY. Among the total of 9,428 persons examined, 30 clear cases of diet deficiency diseases were identified and probably more were unidentified. This is about a third of one per cent of identified diet deficiency diseases. For each actual disease, there were probably a great many cases on the border-line, of persons suffering from some diet deficiency, but not actually yet diseased. Of these cases, 25 were beri-beri, 3 were scurvy and 2 were rickets. The chief source of beri-beri cases was the Circle of Nagor Rajasima, a section where the new railroad had just recently brought in the rice mill, 277 The people away from the railroad ate a great deal of pounded glutinous rice and had only 3 cases of diet deficiency disease. Tabulations were made as to the diet of the three classes, wealthy, milddle and Poor. No aprarent differences were found, other than that the middle class seemed to eat more than the upper and lower classes. Another peculiarity of Siamese diet deficiency is that it is about as Prevalent among the wealthy peasant class as among the middle and poorer classes. The totality of information gathered seemed to suggest that <1diet deficiency was more a matter>1 of <1lack>1 of <1knowledge>1 of <1dict rat her>1 <1than a lack of>1 food. The variations of diet among the social classes in the country are very small. In such a territory as the Northeast where new railway lines are being built, the tendency to diet defi- ciency is greater for the well-to-do, because they are the ones who buy milled rice first of all. Thus it is possible to say that over-population has not pushed the country to a condition of diet deficiency. Rather it is the lack of knowledge of proper diet. Particularly is this true in the time of the introduction of the rice mills and before the people adjust the amount of fish or animal food consumed to the new rice, packing in pericarp. The diet deficiency diseases in the Northeast indicate this clearly. Five of the cases of beri-beri were at Ubol and six at Khukhan, both rlaces where the railroad had brought in a great many rice mills in the past five years. CONCLUSIONS. In general, the Siamese have accommodated their diet to their needs so that diet deficiency does not exist in a very great degree. This is in spite of the fact that the major composition of the diet is rice and fish. Milk or milk products, meat, poultry or eggs are not eaten very often by the country reople. There seems to be very little or no malnutrition resulting from the pressure of population on the natural resources. Recent changes toward milled rice and imported (shipped from the sea coast) dried fish in the country districts of 278 the interior have caused a problem of adjustment. Measures to meet this problem can be taken by a restrictiOn of the retail sale of cleanly milled rice or from measures to increase the consumption of fish and animal food. Restriction on sale Of milled rice is a difficnlt administrative matter. Probably the best method of meeting the situation is to continue and increase the work of fish conservation, to encourage the consumption of animal food where possible, and to educate the people concerning proper diets. The focal points seem to come among weaning children, among growing childreu and among women in the child-bearing stages of life. CHAPTER XIlI. REGIONAL PROBLEMS This study has shown in the previous chapters that the Kingdom of Siam is divided roughly into four major sections, the North, the Northeast, the South and the Center, each of which has problems peculiar to itself. In this chapter the attempt is made to bring the chief suggestions for all these sections together and to map out a brief program for each. <1THE NORTH.>1 As the facts given rreviously show, this is an area which is just making the transition from the self-sufficing economy to the commercialized economy. Next to the central sections, it is of greatest commercial importance at present, if the small tin mining sections of the South are omitted from consideration. Agriculturally it has the next highest average income and the next greatest development at present. The chief problems of this area, separate from the general problems of agriculture and true for all of Siam, may be listed as follows :---- 1. Much good land is uncultivated or poorly cultivated. 2. There seems to be some evidence of under-pOpulation. 3. Practically the whole population suffers from endemic and epidemic malaria. 4. Communication, which is developing raridly, is still totally lacking in many districts. 5. Water facilities, particularly the construction of more efficient small barrages are needed in some sections. 6. Many districts capable of two crops do not at present folloW such practice unless the first crop fails or there is an emergency. " 288 7. Co-operative Credit Societies are needed as soon as Possible. The moral and industricus nature of the population seems to be excellent. In spite of the fact that in some of the outlying distriets there were an unusual number of crop watching cottages, this is but a condition of local administration which can be remedied by greater attention to the matter on the part of the already highly competent local officials. The increase in cultivated land is partly a matter of greater population and partly a matter of improvements in the present system of local barrages aud canals. The population can be secured by two methods, by colonization and by natural increase. Colonization is already taking place, by movement north-ward from the central sections and by a movement out from the more populated sections nearer the citics to the leaser populated sectiona. Natural increaae is already taking place, in spite of the handicap of endemic malaria of a pernicious sort, but the fundamental great and rapid increase is largely dependent upon a regional program for the control, wholly or partially, of malaria- OVER-POPULATION SCARCELY POSSIBLE- It is necessary at this point to indicate that there is little danger of over-population in this region, and any program for the increaae of the population has little chance, if any, of pauperizing the people on account of too great a ratio between population and natural resources. The reasons for this are as follows. First, the land is not now utilized to as great an extent asit was in earlier days in this section, particularly during the time of the grandeur of old Chiengsen and the many ruined cities which at present cover the country with interesting and historic remains. Second, the technique of agriculture, which is as highly developed now as it has ever been in the cultivated areas of this section, ia very primitive. One might predict freely a doubling of rice preductivity in the preaent cultivated area with proper plowing, gradual systemS for the utilization of the subsoil, the introduction of complete utilization of all natural 289 fertilizer, and, perhars later, the introdnction of the use of a small amount of commercial fertilizer, (if rroved economically beneficial) in many of the districts which do not receive an annual coat of silt. However, considering the low price for rice which always exists in this section, in relatiou to world prices, and the high cost of fertilizer commercial fertilizer will assume any economic importance for many decades. Unless there is a local market for all the rice, or the world price for rice rises permanently above the pre-slump level, the use of commercial fertilizer with the present crnde system of tillage would not seem to justify itself in this region. On the other hand, natural fertilizer which is not used at all in this region should be developed in use as rapidly as the peorle cau be ahoWn the value of its utilization. It costa Dothing but labor and the seasonal labor utilization here furniahes a ready supply, if the people could be convinced of the utility of a more developed agricultural technique. A good course of adult education about improved agriculture coupled with elimination of some of the malaria which is at present weakening tbe vitality of practically the whole country porulation and a greater pressure of porulation will do much along this line. A third reason why there is no danger of over-ropulation in this district is that it is doubtful if malaria can ever be checked completely, unless there is a revolution in the medical technique for the treatment of this disease. Probably it may be reduced from an endemic stage in the majority of the districts but it will always hover about the communities ready to sweep forward in an epidemic atage and carry off-its toll of lives with each favorable oprortunity The development of agriculture, tbe impounding of more water, the further utilization of two annual croPs in a rotation system will see more water, more moaquitoes, and more danger from malaria. Under the preseut system of medical technique, in relation to the agricnl- tural technique of thia district, quinization and mosquito nets with posaible rebuilding of villages away from the water seem about all that can be done. These will check, reduce the harmful effects and 290 tend to control malaria but will not eliminate it. Wholesale drainage, which many suggest as the alternative to quinization, is impossible in this region. Water and Siamese agriculture are inseparable and the greater development of agriculture will see more water. Further, many of the most harmful mosquitoes in this area breed in clear local drainage and the rebuilding of agricultural village sites can be accomplished without hindering the agricultural productivity, these should be carried out. The siting of the present northern villages are primarily in two places, along the water system and along the roads. If roads could be planned away from water, and villages malaria would disappear. In the light of these and further consi- derations, which are not discussed here, the danger of over-popula- tion in this district is practically nil. Rather, the great danger is that unless strong and energetic uational measures are taken in regard to the health problem in these Provinces, there will never be sufficient population in the North to stimulate and encourage a more developed agricultural technique and to furnish that density of tax- payers, essential, under the system of farming followed in the Orient, to the self-supporting of certain uecessary westernized public utilities such as railroads, metalled highways, hospitals, technical schools and their rroducts, etc. The problem of the devclopment of the agricul- tural technique is dependent largely, in addition to population, upon the concurrent development of agricultural research work, and the promotion of better economic methods through the District agricul- tural demonstration and extension force. This is discussed in more detail in the next Chapter. COMMUNICATION. Communication is developing raridly in the North, as a result of the extension of the Royal Siamese Railways, road building at Chiengmai, from Lampang to the Northern border, and the Partial construction of the other system from Prae north through Nan. The results of these extensions of communication have been very beneficient indeed, particularly in an economic sense. As far 291 as could be told from a careful study of the country, there had been no bad moral results upon the population from the greater com- munication. The Chinese are replacing the former Siameae merchants in many of the village markets, but as yet the problem is not serious, although becoming so. The main handicaps to the rapid improvement of com- munication is the lack development of local roads of earth aa feeders to the main highways which are being metalled. This problem was not as serioua here as in some other parts of Siam. WATER USAGE. The construction of small barrages for the greater utilization of the water resources in this section, other than some possible large schemes for the barraging of the larger streama and rivers is something which the local ropulation can handle itself. However, the technique of construction of these barrages and canals by the local Porulation is very crude and inefficient, in srite of the general high development of irrigation technique among the Northern people. The country people need more leadership and guidance concerning irrigation from the officials who represent the Central Government. This can be solved by sending a few young Siamese men trained in engineering to this section and have them make it their business to study the whole situation and advise the local ; people under the leadership of the higher officials. These young men need an engineering education and some practical experience coupled with a great deal of discretion and common sense. Involved and expensive methods will not succeed. No group of people can manage the involved methods without expensive expert help and the country people of the North cannot bear the cost of expensive methods. In illustration of What can be done along these lines attention may be called to an interesting experiment at Hua Bat Weir in Mae Kammee (Rong-Kwang District, Prae ). Here the settlers were leaving the land on account of the lack of water. The Governor of the province went to this commune and directed the 292 local people to build a weir which would imround the water and furnish sufficient for their crops. The weir was built at no expense tO the Government and the settlers came back to the land. This ' weir was eapable of doing the work, even if built very crudely. If the officials had, as their advisers, men with engineering training, theae same weirs could be built more permanently, capable of greater efficiency and greater capacity, and furnish water at lesser long time cost. The general problem of impounding the water of tbe larger pressing at this time, for those sections of the country which were studied. We do not feel capable of discussing the general problem of water shortage at Lampaug ; rather it is the task for a qualified engineer and Only after an inteusive study of the problem with regard to implicatious in economics, the soil of this rrovince aud the available population for the utilization of the water. CROP ROTATION. In the single crop section, where rice is the staff of life, cror rotation is more or less an impossibility. But two crop sections and there are many such in the North, can work out a definite syatem of crop rotation with great increase iu economic productivity. In this respect, therc are several dangers----to wit, the souring of land, the over utilization of land and the destruction of the natural fertility of the soil. At present the areas in the North capable of two croPs are used but seldom, princiPally when the first croP fails and secondarily during periods of low price where the returns from the first crop do not pay the debts. The development of other crops was bandicapped until the Present year by the high transPorta- tion rates to the markets at Bangkok and the lack of sufficient local Population to consume the vegetables and crops grown. The rates have now been reduced, but it will be years before the peoPle of the North send much to Bangkok, unlesa a definite Policy of encouraging the Population to grow these vegetablea, is adopted. Only crops which do not take the same relationship to the Soil 293 that rice does, can be grown successfully as a second crop. Further quick growing crops are needed in order to give the ground a rest between the second crop of any year and the first crop of the next year. It is all a very complicated problem which can be handled, how- ever, if a definite experimental station and economic policy is entered upon by the Government. The North is one of the possible sources of a disease-free vegetable supply for Bangkok without competing with or eliminating any of the rice growing sections of the South. The North is also a rotential source for fruit for Bangkok, particu- larly for some types not grown in the lowlands of the South and in the southern peninsula. At present these demands are partly supplied by Chinese imports. Other than the economic factors of balance of trade, the chief consideration is the nse of human fertilizer for many of the vegetables sold in the markets of Bangkok. This, as is generally known, is undesirable from the standpoint of the spreading of intestinal parasites and diseases. The people of the North know nothing of this system of fertilization and have no important source for the securing of human fertilizer if they did. Many economic methods of developing this industry as a second crop in a rotation system, for much of the territory in the North could be developed, but it all depends basically upon some concrete studies of soil and plants in that territory and the relation of these to the problem of the main crop----rice. Its promotion is the work of an extension force. Research and adult education must go together. CO-OPERATIVE CREDIT The next great regional problem of the North is the need for co-operative credit societies. This is given special mention here, in addition to the discussion in the Charter on Credit, because the North is the next important economic section as far aa agriculture is concerned, and because it is already materially on the way to a commercial agriculture. Further, it was easy to observe that the present depression in the more commercialized sections was going to result in a great increase of debts among the peasants and a 294 concurrent demoralization and endangerment of land holdings. The reader should refer esrecially to the Chapter on Credit for further discussion of this matter. <1THE NORTHEAST.>1 The outstanding problems of the Northeast region may be summarized as follows. It must be remembered that, at present, this is an area primarily of self-sufficing agricultural economy but ia beginning to change to a commercial economy. 1. The district is under-populated in many sections. 2. Health, particnlary on account of infections of yaws, stomach parasites and epidemic malam, is poor. 3. Water facilities. particulary for drinking and bathing, are crude and inefficient. In most regions, they are the very sonrces of infections leading to the high death-rate. 4. Communication except where the railroad is built and along the river leading through Roi Et to Ubol is almost totally lacking. (A part of the season this river is navigable almost to Khonkaen). 5. Cash crops, other than rice, are not developed at all although much of this land is not suited for rice production. 6. Dry land crops, especially cotton, tobacco, peanut and forage crors which seem suited to this area are not develored. The silk industry should be developed more. 7. Small fiood gates for control of the Mekong during the high water period and the preservation of fishing swamrs, in the low water period are not develoPed at all. This is one of the great potential sources for increase of the amount of rice land. 8. No definite policy for the adjudication of disputes over the swamp areas has been taken. Consequently village disputes over the utilization of the swamp areas are settled in a crude fashion ofteutimes resnlting in injustices to the peaceful masses of the population. 295 UNDER-POPULATION. There sre some river valleys which are heavily populated but in the great majority of this territory it is possible to travel for hours without seeing a village. With proper development, this area can support three times its present population with a higher standard of living than that of the present population. HEALTH. This whole population may be said to bc suffering or to have the children with but a few marks. In other, the individual is left with deformations of the bone tissue wliich destroy a large part of his economic value to the community. Considering the simple nature of the disease, as far as diagnosis and care in most cases are concerned, this matter may be attacked on a wholesale scale. probably one of the particular reasons why yaws are so bad in this area is the lack of bathing water for cleanliness in the dry season. At any rate, those poor facilities for bathing and drinking water are resPonsible for much of the high death-rate in this area. WATER. The average inland village in this area secures its water from wells which are mere holes in the ground, with no walls to keep out surface drainage, no rroteeting walls to enable the wells to be dug to any great depth, and no mechanical faeilities such as ropes and pulleys for the elevating of water from deer wells. The average well is a sort of a mudhole, redug every few years, seldom contain- ing more than 12 inches of water during the dry season. These wells are very dangerous. Oftentimes they are dug by the village children, because the men of the villages are absent in the jungle or at work much of the time during the dry season. Constructing a crude, un-walled, earthen well is a dangerous occupation for men not to mention children. The country needs a water source survey to indicate where wells may and may not be dug and the probable depths to good 296 Water. In some sections it must be only a short distance to water, because the peasants dig wells in the middle of their fields and use them for watering small tobacco fields during the dry season. In Others it seems much deeper distances. Some areas must depend upon surface water. If these areas are located, proper provisions to prCvide swamps and storage tanks can be taken. Once the water has been located and mapped, healthful, efficient and economical methods for the construction and utilization of the wells and surrly tanks should be developed, and the informa- tion circulated among the officials and common people. This is a country of a very wet wet-seascn and a very dry dry-season. Its water problems demand immediate attention but are not insurmoun- table. COMMUNICATION. The problem of communication has already been well handled by the plans of the Ministry of Commerce and Communications. It needs only be emphasized that this area will probably develop more in prorortion to its present conditions than any other area of Siam with the spread of communication. CASH AND DRY--LAND CROPS. The country needs cash crops, other than rice, because since ments in cottou culture, in tobacco culture in development further of silk culFure, and in the cultivatiou Of more efficient forage and feed crops for the feeding of animals should be tried. The area has a Wet season to start the cotton plant and a dry sesson to make it ripen with little loss on account of rain damage, discoloration or delayed ripen- ing. The area is not dissimilar to those sections in Western Texas in the United States of America where the growing of cotton ia increasing very fast at the Present time. There is already an indigenous tobacco culture in most of the villages, although it is limited primarily to home consumrtion. This may be developed by study and by demonstration and extension Work. One of the problems needing attention is the burning quality of the tobacco. Some of it seems to burn poorly on account of insufficient time. This can be remedied very economically. One of the characteristics of tobacco grown in this region is that it is freer from sucking insects and leaf mould and wilt than iu the other sections of Siam. This is probably due to the isolation of the country. The development of tobacco growing should be accompanied with studies of the spread of these diseases and parasites and methods for their control. Silk culture, associated with home weaving, is already indi- genous to thia area. Its development can be promoted by Proper study and guidance. Animal feeding is already developed in this area, particularly along the railway lines. However, there is no development at all of the forage grasses. The current method in most communities is to use the forage grasses that grow there naturally and to stop at that. There are unquestionably many improved forage grasses known to the agricultural scientists which may be introduced into this area. Further, those already there may be grown for more efficient feed production. In the United States of America, sWeet clover which was a rank and troublesome weed parasite in the limestone areas 15 years ago has now become one of the most desired forage grasses in many sections. This was achieved through plant breeding. The same technique could be used to develope the forage grasses of the Northeast. FLOOD GATES ON THE MEKONG. The Mekong river bore somewhat the same relation to the Khmer civilization that the <1Chao Phya>1 bears to the Siamese civili- zation. But the Khmers not only developed the Mekong and its branches but also the <1Chao Phya,>1 particularly in its urper system. It is from the Khmer civilization that the Thai, an integral and important part of the Khmer civilization before the 13th century, ; probably first learned most of the art of river control and irrigation. 298 The chief problems of the MekOng may be indicated as follows. It is a river with a deer bed making the eost of barraging prohibitive at present, considering the fact that it is also an interna- tional boundary. But like all rivers of any great age, it has built, through the process of inundation and silting, banks higher than the surrounding country. As a result, where it flows through plains, its back area is a great swamp in the wet season and a great dry jungle in the dry season. This swamP is not ntilized for rice culture at present because when the river does rise and pour throngh the irrigation channels and small streams into the back eountry, it comes in such quantity and with such force that the rice is destroyed o1- drowned out. And, similarly, when the river goes down, its channel is so deep that the swamp water runs quickly to the main channel and leaves insuffiient water along the gently sloring edges of the swainrs for the comletion of the rice crop Further, the rarid retreat of the water of the Mekonp to the central channel destroys the fish culture of the swamps by leaving insufficient water. The control of the major channels entering the #ekong is an expensive mattej- requiring the outlay of large sums of money for barrages and for the construction and maintenance of locks. Consi- lering everything at present, it does not seem advisable for the Central Government to attack the major channels at first. However. the minor chanuels of irrigation, of which there is approximately one for each village, may be controlled by the villagers, at their own expense, if the prorer evidance and instructions are given them by engineers sent out by the Central Government to the diffierent provinces along the Mekong. The building of these irrigation gates, with bases of cement and strong wooden gates, should not be beyond the fiiiances at present available to the average village. The work should be done by the villagers under the supervision of officials and according to the advice and plans of engineers. The control of these village gates could be left to the villagers themselves. However, before the building of the gates rough engineering surveys should determine the water levels which should be maintained at different times of the year. 299 This method Of control of the water will result in great mereases in rice production and greater fish resources for the people. In most of these sections there is an available use for surplus rice, either in the interior or along the Mekong in the provincial cities Or among the mining populations. With the development of the railways and the roads, much of the surplus if there is one, can be transported to the interior to sell. An increasing population will ; take care of much of the increased food resources. The nature of the banks of the Mekong makes each irrigation canal more or less a self-contained nnit, so the water entering one swamr does not effect the water in another swamp farther up or down the river. Control by single villages is feasible and practical and probably can be done without much expense. A SwAMP AREA SURVEY. One of the important phases of village life in the Northeast is the use of the sivamp. These swamps always become extended in the wet season and recede during the dry season. During the dry season the swamr serves three purposes a fishing Place for the village, a watering rlaco for the village and the village buffaloes, and as dry season rice fields for the poor of the village. Every season many villages become involved in bitter disputes. There are always families who wish to drain the swamp at once in order to get all the fish in a hurry, and other families who wish the swamp drained cOmpletely for the extension of dry season rice lauds. These families oftentimes secure control of the situation, by methods of village politics in which they are well versed, and draiu the whole swamp, or its major areas, to the harm of the remainder of the village families. The matter is carried through the usual channels to the higher officials for adjudication, but these men being inexperienced in the local situation and having a wholesome fear of the long lawsuits which may be created over land and swamr rights, seldom do any- thing decisive in the matter. The Problem is of such a serious and general nature that it is evident that a general swamp land survey is needed in many of 300 the provinces. The rurpose shOuld be to determine the customary areas of these swamps aud the area most beneficial to all interests and parties concerned. Once this is determined aud marked off plainly, the officials can adjudicate future disputes decisively. Most of the reorle of the Northeast are of snch a peaceful and obedient nature that official determination of these boundaries at the present time could be done in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred without any recourse to law. Later, the problem will become more difficult. If determined at this time, at later dates the customary boundaries will be so settled that many future lawsits and much legal trouble will be avoided. CONCLUSION FOR THE NORTHEAST. It neem not be rercated that the character of the people of the Northeast and theire promises of economic development makes them worthy of more helr. once their problems have begun to be studied, other ways, of helring these peorle withont the expenditures of large amounts of governmental funds may be found. A little attention will soon repay for itself by the possibility of the extension of many forms of taxation in very light but economically importaut forins. This is an area with rains throughout the year. It may be ealled a " green jungle " area because the foliage is green the year around. The territory is mountainous except near tlie coast. The soil is sandy. There are many deposits of tin. The two or three commercial agricultural indnstries are rubber growing, copra produc tion and the sale of animals to the markets to the South fOr meat. Fishing is a comerical industry along the coast. The majority of the people do general self-sufficing farming with fishing during the slack season. The outstanmiiig problems of this CerritOry are as follows :---- 2. Disease in alI the ordinary forms known in Siam is rife. Agricultural technidue is simrler here than else- where in Siam. 4. Fruit breeding aud unprovement, especially the cocoanut is needed badly. 5. Second crop agriculture to suprly the deficit of = food in the area as a whole is needed. A diversified agriculture casli economic Policy is needed 7. Harbor facilities for water cominunication are ueeded. 8. The good roads make centralization of Local Government units feasible with great savings in administration in some areas. POPULATION. The underffppulation in this area is due chiory to the ideQl condition which existS fOr tbe production and disaemination of parasites, particularly those which cause malaria, yaws, aud inteatinQl diseases. Formerly small-pox was very rife but the vaccination schemes of the Central Goverument have checked this severely. Iu aomc districts there are eveu more lands once farmed that are noW lying idle while the owners work in the tin indnstry than are being farmed. The territory generally ean suPport a much larger poPulation. Mauy fields capable of growing rice are still in jungle. Of course these fields are not always the best, but there is no evidence of over-Population or danger of over-population. 'The agricultural technique needs development. Most of the : farms here can grOw two crops a year On account of the diatribution of rainfall. Two crops of rice might not be the best combiuation, but those other great foOd croPs----beans, and peanuts are not cultivated. Therc is the possibility of more vegetables. Most of the cornmunities have use for more home Produced food. The situation in the village studied near jumbor Was more or less typical. aany of the villagers wished to quit farming at the end Of the first crop----rice, and go to sea fishing. The Others shOrt of food Wiahed to groW a 302 second crop. But there were so many rats in the village that unless the whole arra was in cror, the rats concentrated on the few fields of the smaller farms and soon destroyed them. In this village, as a rule, the people did not plow the lad at all. They either hoed Or sladed it by hand or turned a herd of buffaloesloose in the field after it was thoroughly covered with water There was no seed selection, no use of manure, no mnprovemeut or breeding of the fruit-trees or iio real develorment of what may be called a careful agriculturc The South formerly sold a great deal of corra. The comng rubber and the spread of tin mining gave industrial and agricultural orportunities which paid more, so the people left the coPra industry and entered these others. Now tin and rubber prices are down and the cocoanut trees are gone. The peorle need tO be taught a diversified farming and to be educated to keer it up. In the corpa imdustry, there is a particular need for the breeding of a more productive cocoanut. The situation is not disaimilar to the sugar beet iudustry. It did not pay in comParison with cane sugar so the governments started to breeding a sugar beet with higher sogar producing capacity. At Present the moderu sugar beet bears from three to five times the sugar that was done by the old unselected beet. Beet sugar is still grown behind tariff walls, but nevertheless it is more capable of competing with cane sugar thau ever before. A cocoanut from three to five times as productive of copra would change the corra industry in the South. The need for a second crop agriculture cannot be stressed too much considering the low incomes of the People generally. The agricultural system needs diversification. All food crops should be produced locally even in the prosperous years and times. This is particularly evident now that times are hard in the rubber and tin industries. The Southern sections should find more cattle fOr the markets in the peninsula. Cattle and swine breeding should be in- troduced. These people have great interest in the cattle industry. Their favOrite diversion at festivals is bull-fighting. A more Produc- tive beef variety should be develped. The need for harbor facilities is evident. Mnch of the cost of 308 some of three imrrovements can be secued by a centralization of some of the local governmental functions since the metalled road system has reduced the time required to go from one district to auother. The Government is already rlanning to attack this rroblem. Clentral Siam is considered here in three rarts Chandaburi, - Klong Rangsit and the remainder of the central valley. Each section has its peculiar problems. CRANDAEURI. This historic section of Siam is porulated by am exceedingly High grade of Peorle, and considering oljpotunities, the agricultural technique is the most developed in Siamo Much of the soil is not a rice growing soil and the people bave developed other industries for this nOn-rice territory. Among these two need mention, the fruit areas and the reprer areas. There is some cubber. commencing to develop and af one tinie there were some coffee rlantations there. The need for completion of the metalled road to Bangkok miay be stressed. The principal problem is the preservation and development of the pepPer industry. PePper has been grown here for a long time. No one seems to know when it first began. Thc technique for prepai-ation of the soil, sterilization of the plant beds, use of manure, selecting and growing peppers is fairly well developed. However, the people are now faced with three or four probleins. One is that pePper prices are low. This probably cannot be helped other than through the reduction of costs of production and, later, after some experience has been gained, by the development of co-operative marketing. Again, the middlemen, according to the claims of the local peOple, formerly rractised soaking the reppers in water to give them more weight. This made the perpers spoil rapidly and harmed the name of the Chandaburi district as a place for the production of gOod peppers. Problems such as this can be solved Permanently only by co-operative marketing. As is shown later, co-operation should be taken up very slowly after the people have conquered 304 some of their technical problems which makes Production cOsts high. A third Problem is the prevalence of a great many sucking insects and other insect Parasites. The present methods for the control of these insects is to spray with tobacco aud <1kapiet>1 and is expensive. There is need for some iminediate investigations to find a chemical substitute for this <1kapiet>1 which will do the work of eliminating theinsect parasites more cheaply or to find a cheaPer source for <1kapiet.>1 Probably one of the first stePs should be to iutroduce more econo1nical methods of sPraying in order to prevent the grcat waste of <1kabiet>1 aud tobacco by the present rather crude methods of spraying. A cheaper tobacco for spraying is also needed. However, the great problem of this industry ia the increased appearauce aud sPread of a root fungus during the Past five yeara. The people do not knoy how to conquer this fungua. It is as disas- troua to the pepper planta aa the rindlirpest ia to a hord of cattle. It spreadS among the fields aS a blight and ruina whole plantatioua. A repper spocialiat should be detailed to apend his whole time at some place like Ta-Mai until he has helped the people to solve the imporcant problems of the industry. It cannot be done froln a distance. Some oue must study the fungus, the problems of the iudustry and show the people how to conquer the rroblems, if Poa- sible. The fungua should be identified, and if there is a method of treatment or elimination, the Peogle should be shown how to do this. If not, it will eventually conquer the induatry as far as practical economic value is concerned. The land on wliich this pepper is grown is not rice land. Fruit is already produced in this area more than there is a Profitable sale comsidering the Present methods of communication with the outside markets. There is no aternative opPortunity for this area. The peprer industry should be saved or some of the people should be moved away and colonized. If, following a few years of work, the industry begins to jmprove and increase, and the people have confidence in the work for their industry, the time for the gradual development of 3O5 cooperative marketing has arrived- A perper specialiat can ahoW the people hoW to grade their peppers and to prepare them for the exporter. The reople can organize a " Peprer Growers Co-operative Marketing Socirty" at that time, and attembt to sell directly to the exPorter. If this is snccessful, they can take advice from the exporters as to the quality of peppems needed most, the imrrovementa needed, and begin on a gradua prograin of producing the kind and quality which tit the market demand. This industry seema one of the most ideal for experiments of tho sort indicated above. HoWever, it can be doue only if an agricultnral srecia]ist is sent there to live aud if he ia backeil up by identificatiou and control of the fungua and wilth other problems. 306 and the tenant paid the taxes which amounted to another Bant per rai. The local peorle do not own lands except a few large pieces in the hands of local money-lenders. Agricultural techniqne is of the poorest sort. The plowing is very poor. The land is a heavy gunbo which makes plowing and cultivation difficult. 'the rice is broadcasted and farming is done b the mcst extensive of methods. No machinery is used in cultivation other than the wooden rlow and harrow. No fertilizer is used in thc cultivation. The manume from the bullocks aud farm animals is generally dutnped once or twice a day into the nearby canal. Some of the farmers once introduced modern machinery aud lost money becauae it was not adapted to the conditions of the region and because the mechanical difficulties were too mnch for the cnltivator. The peoPle have the largest farms and the uiost rice laud be- fainily to be found in Siam. At the same time the economic and cultural conditions are the poorest. Each year the peasant iucurs a debt to the Chneae merchant, to the Siameae landlord and for the taxes. If the crop is poOr or the pricea are low,the rent is not paid. the landlord must pay the taxes and the merchant takes what rice is threshed for his account. Then the tenant moves to another farm and starts over again. It was recognized some time ago that there was not a suffi- cient head of water impounded for this area, considering the low rainfall in Siam and the periodicity of this raiufall. So the peasant was advised by mauy who understood the problem, including the late King in his dedication sreech at the barrage and irrigation work at Ta Luang in 1924, to bund his fields and to introduce pumPing for the beginning of the rice season. The two water problems of this area can be met in this way. On account of the nature of the soil the land cannot be plowed unless it is wet. But in 1nany years rains do not come sufficiently early in this district to furnish water for the rlowing at the proPer season. Later when the rains do come, the water comes up so rapidly that the rice is often ruined by too much water. Bunding and the nse Of the small oil pump enables plowing at the right time each year. 307 Then aS soon as the water rises in the canal the water can enter the field without pumring. When sufficient has entered, the inlet may be closed and the problem of too much waLer is solved excert on years of great floocls. In spite of this condition and this advice, little has been done about the matter. The chief reasons seem to be, the people have not been rroperly discirlined by good local leadership and con- trolled through village life, the peorle are very poor, and the tenure coutract does not permit the tenant any recOurse of he builds a home on a farm, or if he builds a bund around his field and imrroves the farm. Further, there is no land ownershir by the cultivators. During the course of the study, one case was found where a farmerinprovrd a farmny bunding, thinling that he would make the money back if nndisturbed for ten years. In three years the land was sold and the rent raised so that rarticular tenant lost and became discouraged. As a result of these conditions, the people have become more or less irresponsible and hopeless. In many cases they do not pay the rent or the taxes if they can move away to ancther Place. There is no stimulus to improvement. In response to this condition among the peoPle, and on account of the fact that the people have only a cror security for loans, the interest rates are very high. They are generally 5 Baht a month for each 100 Baht, a rate which amount to 60 per cent a year for the poor people. Further,in tnaes of uucertainty, there is no money to be secured at this rate for the poorer cultivators. SO the farmers are forcrd out of cultivation. Mauy of them are good people however and carable of development if guided. Un accoumt of the lack of homestea and vilage sites among the People there is no gardening and home production of food, so that every thihg the peasant consumes must be bought from the time-merchant. Diet is reduced to the simplest terms. It consists ordinarily of rolished rice, salt, peppers, a small quantity of fermented fish and a sauce for the rice. The <1nam Pla>1 consists of about 60 per cent water, more than 30 per cent salt, and about 7 per cent fish extractive. There was aome evidence of diet deficiency. 308 The Peorle keer their buff-aloes in their houses, because there is uo hope of rerayment if other shelters are built. Further. the poor conditiOns often lead to buffalo stealing. The buffalo is about the only property the people havc. It is discouraging to sce such excellent agricultural possibili- ties so poorly develored add used. Yet the problem of imrroving conditions in this area is very digcult. Co-oPerative credit societies will not work at present considering the Poor quality of many of the people and the lack of any tangible security. The needs of this district may be listed as follows :---- 1. Smaller and better cultivated farms. 2. Honesmead village and more stable residence. Long trrm leaseholds with provisions for rerayment if the cultivator improves his farm and then has to move away. 4. MIOre land-ownetrship among small cultivators rOm 30 to 50 rai). 5. MIore rigid diacipline of the people in matters of responsibility and respect for property. In sPite of the fact that the Rangsit Experimental Station is iu this district and has developed an improved variety of rice, many of the people do not care even to go and trade their ond seed for the new seed. Part of this is the fault of the merchaut, the landlord or the mouey-lender. The <1Krasctra>1 plow should be introduced generally. 1t costs only 10 Baht and will repay for itself the fist year. Manure should be used. Many better methods are needed. 'jhe avcrage farmer produces a kwien of padi on rai. An ordinary careful farmer does twice as well, and a real good farmer, without the use of commercial fertilizer, has beeu knowu to average a kwien for each 2 rai. This shows that the average farmer in thia territory, by good farming methods, could reduce his rent, tax, labor and seed bills a half and secure the same production by the use of bunding, pumPing and more careful farming methods. To achieve this, and it cannot be done in a few years, there is a need for homestead sites in villages, on higher and more 309 healthful lands if possible. This will eliminate some of the constant mOving, enable the people to build better homes, help them to have gardens to reduce the cost of living, and to secure more safety from crime. Finding the homestead sites and rersuading the people to live there is a difficult problem, bnt the real improvement of this area cannot be achieved unless this is done. LOng term leaseholds with rrovisions for repayment of the cultivator if he improves the farm should be achieved as soon as possible. Perhaps this work will have to be established among the better farmers and later spread to the roorer The development is not dissimilar to the " Holdings Acts" in many countries for districts Where all the farmers are tenants and where on account of pOor leasing cOnditions no one is willing to accept the responsibijity for the development of the farms. Landlords who own land here shOuld take more interest in their farms and should be willing to spend some money in improving the places themselves. However. it will oftentimes be wasted money unless careful tenants are secured and unless these tenants are well and sympathetically supervised bV some one locally who wants the area to develop. To meet this rroblem under present conditions. it would seem wise if the larger estates or farm units created by ioinin the smaller estates would secure the services of local managers of higher agricultural training, quality and higher ideals than many of those there at rresent. A rent cOllector is not a farm manager in the best sense of the word. The manager shOuld have some responsibilitV and knowledge as well as interest in the agricultural development of the region. At the present, the peorle are simply " water farmers If the water comes they have crop. If it does not come or there is toO much, they spend their time quarreling with the irrigation engineers. Possibly the Chainat barrage scheme on the Will add more water to the region. This is projected but under any circumstances it will be many years before it is completed. Even then there will be more lands to irrigate and the same prOblem of seasonal lack of water will be felt. So if the farmers are not 31O willing to use the bund and the pump, there will be the same trOuble as at present. More land-ownership among the cultivators is ueeded. Govern- memt settlement schemes might be tried. A good leasing scheme, if develored along with the recrpation of a village life and a better discirline among the people, will do much of the same good as a set- tlement scheme. The problems of this district are very difficult----they are serious. Under any circumstances it will take years to improve the situation. But a well thought out policy, if begin at this time. ean solve it in time. The chief danger is the fallacy of believing that a simple remedy can conquer the whole complex trouble in a few years. It is a bad situation. The district is very imrortant economically. It should challenge the thinking of the country for some time. OTRER PARTs OF CENTRAI, SIAM. N"w that the problems of Chandaburi and Klong Rangsit have been eiven particular attention, let us turn to Tentral Siam in general. This is the econmically important area of Siam as far as exrOrts and commercial agriculture is concerned. It iustly deserves a great deal of attention from the Government. H"wever attentiou to its problems should not lead to the neglection of thCse great and important areas in the North. Northeast and South. We may summarize the general problems of the Center by the following statements :---- 1. AlthOugh some districts are heavily populated, the vast areas of laud yet capable of drvelorment shows that this area does not have any serious problem of over- population. There is no reason. as far as populatiCn is concerned. why serious inroads on the problen of the high death-rate should not be made at once. 2. There is no developed agricultural credit sysem and, as a result, the lands are passing gradually into the hand of neW owners, particularly, tbe Tnoney-lenders. the recent economic crisis will greatly hasten this trend. 311 3. In general, there is a shortage of Water, under the present agricultural technique. This shortage of water is due princiPally to the fact that Siam has a short season of heavy rains, but nOt a heavy general rainfall. This rainfall period retamds or advances itself from season to season so that practically every crop suffers from either a drought at the beginning of the season or at the end of the season. Further. it may suffer from too great a concentration of water at one part of the season. An improved technique for the individual cultivator is the only method of meeting this problem. 4. The cultivation and the agricultnral technique is good in some places and poor in others. In general, thc introduction of scientific 1nethods should result in great gains everywhere. There are some districts in this territory that have sufficient population for the rresent, considering the present development of agriculture. But there is no district that is not within approximately fifty kilometres of another district that is under-populated even con- sidering the present development of agricultural methods in Siam. The eastern irrigation scheme around Klong Rangsit could support triPly its present Population and have a higher average income if the methods of tillage used there were as good as those at Chaxerngsao or along the Nagor Chaisri river. The whole territory from the edge of the tidewater north in the valley of the is under- cultivated. Passing from Bisnulok to Lobburi carefnlness in cultivation diminishes appreciably and there is room for an extension of the area Of cultivation by clearing up the jungle land. All the ontlying districts need more peoPle. None of the districts now under cultivation may be said to use any advanced agricultural technique such as natural manuring, seed selection, careful plowing, early pumPing of water, ete. Eveu the old Chinese wooden pump used in the best districts are not a tenth as efficient as an ordinary pressed steel suction pump which could be made in quantities as cheaply as the wCoden pump. At Ayudhya the farmers do not evan kill the weeds preparatory to 312 planting the rice. They simply broadcast rice, sometimes after a plOwing. sometimes before. They then plow or harrow the rice under by the simrlest methods and tools. Sometimes they break up the clOds of earth and sometimes they do not. A hoe is used for the clods rather than a disk. h well sheared rlow woulLl do twice the work in the same time, do it better, and tire the bullocks or buffialoes less. The <1krasetra>1 rlow which is devcloped at the Rangsit Station weighs the same as the wooden plow 28 pounds) and does all Of these things more economically. In spite of the fact that it costs only 10 Baht, it is not in use among the people. Then the peorle of Ayudhya await the coming if the water to kill the weeds and the rice starts in comretition with grass and weeds that are hardier than the rice plants. If the rains are delayed the rice is liandi- capred more. It is always handicapped some in its early growth. In the face of these circumstances it is impossible to believe that this country is over-populstetl or is in any danger of such for the next half century. Under trorical conditions it is diMcult to have enough ropulation much less to secuire a conditiou of over- population. Fortunately in the Center there is little oF the dangerous malaria of the type found in the Circle of Bayab. Malaria in the Center arrears Trincipally dnring ideal conditions which are brought about at times during the rainy season. The peorle in the central rarts are afficted by many diseasrs such as plagued cholera, intestinal parasites, dysenteries, etc. These keep down the numbems and make life a costlv thing. A wide-sfread use of a good rharinacolooy along with personal hygiene and attention to the water surrly and its usage will helP to control this problem. This territory passed from the self-sufficing agricultural conditions so1ne time ago. In certain sections along the canals, rice for export has been grCw for several centuries. But the great majority of the land was not exrorting rice or selling it util early in the 20tl century. Since that time, the rroblem of agricultural credit has become more and thore seriOus. There are no banks nor a banking system. As a result, there has been no mobilization of 315 credit facilities and the interest paid average from 15 to 25 per cent even for good farmers With lands as security. The coun- try has had to develoP witli this handicap. Many farmers Who had tWo or three bad years in succession coud not pay the interest and lost their farms. The past 25 years has been one of a trend toward the gradual coucentration of land into larger and larger owned units and the development of farm tenancy. Me present agricultural crisis will hasten the matter because the farmers do not realize the seriousness Of the crisis. They think that it is purely temporary and will pass quickly. Practically a third of the rice harvested in the year of B.E. 2173 Was still in the hands of the farmers when the central survey was made----in May and june of 2474. They were holding it for better prices. Much interest. Was unpaid and added to the principal. Next year there will be lprs and less local funds to finance the farm operaticns and more and more borrowing from money-lcnders traveling from Bangkok. This will lead to greater and greater concentration of lands. The obvioiis solntion to this matter, a~ i! outlined in the Chrpter on Credit is to begin noW to develop the co-operative credit unions further and to expand them into a conntry banking system. Mis can and should be done. The shortage of water can be met principallV by the increased use of oil punips on the individual farms during the early part of the Aeaqfln. At present this practice is increasing rapidly, but has been checked by the econfomic crisis. Most Of these small engines come frOm America. American export figures lead us to estimate that 10000 small engines under 10 horse power have been introduced to Siam since I927. One of the majOr problems is to keer up thia improvement in spite of the decline iu incomes during the price depression. Such things as these will help the conntry to get over the depressiod more rapidly by reducing the cost of production per One of the handicaps to the movement is the fact that there is as yet no efficoent small farm pnmp in Siam. The old Chinese when trongh pump is so inefficient that it reqnireS twice the power 314 actually needed for pumping and delivers water at tenth of the efficiency of a good cheap nietal pumr. A good metal pump of pressed steel case, with only one or two castings should be sold in Siam for about 75 Baht, which is approximately the average price in Bangkok for the wooden pump. The more general use of a two or three horse power farm engine, with a pump capable of lifting a large volume of water as high as two meters should be encouraged. In most sections less than two meters lift will be nceded. This is the surest guarantee of a good crop of rice every year in many sections of Siam. Finally, there is the problem of the general development of the agricultural technique by the application of the science to the study of the problems and the use of Agricultural Extension . SPecialists to demonstrate and encourage the peasants to use the new methods. It is not enough to know. The peorle must be led, shown and taught. It cannot be done in schools. it must be done by work on the individual farms and in the villages with the whole families of the peasants and the village poPulation as a whole. On account of the importance of rice growing, the first work should be turned to this end. Later it should spread to all operations of the farm. Seed selection, use of natural manure, plowing, harrowing, grading of grain, storage of grain, imProved plows, harrow, draft animals, harness----all the ordinary farm rrocesses and utensils should be studied. When these eleinentary things have becn imProved, the efficiency of the average farm in the central plain should at least be doubled in many districts and increased by a half, at least, in the others. There have been some suggestions concerning the use of conimercial fertilizer. In general, all lands which are silted each year need no commercial fertilizer. Some of the credit societies around Lobbnri tried commercial fertilizer last year and found that in the farms covered with river water each year, the gain did not pay for the cost of the fertilizer. The masses of the reople cannOt afford to buy commercial fertilizer as yet, nor do they know how to use it. When the Siamese farmer can rlow and harrow, when he can select seed, When he can use the manure that is noW about his house, when 315 he has reached the pOint that his farming technique is well developed, when the new lamds are taken ur, then the problem of a synthetic fertilizer should be considered and only on the unsilted soils away from the rivers. Until that time any development of the commercial fertilizer busiuess would probably but lead to an another item of cash exPense, and lead to greater debts and greater accumulation of lands into the hands of the money lending class. A NATIUNAL PROGRAM. This study has covered many details. It has delved into many Phases of the complicated problems of economic lifo. It has many faults, many errors of fact, many misiudgments, and many defects. It shOuld represent the work of twenty years instead of one. But economic life moves onward and men must live tomorrow by the judgments of today. Further, the study though done iu ono year has been doue as carefully as has humanly possible within tho timc. 'the problems it deals with are withiu the rauge of human observation. Whatcver may be its faults, it sdows clearly the general nature of the problem of national development so that even the casual reader may see it. In essence this problem is of social organization which has not achieved and is not achieving its full efficieucy for three reasons. Cne is that there has been little or no Pressure to make the country people extend their imagination into better ways of doing things. 'the second is that the masses of the people have just risen from the self-sufficing ecouomy within the past 25 years and have not yet completely learned the sPirit Of the caritalist economy. The general facts aud details of the capitalist and commercial-economic techniquB have not filtered through to the masses of the people. The third is, the agencies for carrying out this capitalist economy have not been completely developed. In other words, the problems of Siam can be atated in three this means a developed agricultural experimental station, a college for educating agricultural leaders and an extension service to put these agricultural leaders to work. 318 In some reapects the work has been a little too critical. It has pointed to wrong practices without praising the good. The Sjaniese cultivator has many goOd traits else he would not produce such large quantities of goOd rice for exPort. He could not have such a high average income compared with the rest of Asia. On the other hand, the study has continually Pointed to economic defects judged entirely from the standroint of what the cultivator can do. The problem of under-Population has been discussed in detail in the earlier Chapter on Health. Every chapter in this u-ork shows the harmful effect of under-porulation on the pcople. There is nothing like necessity to induce economy and ecouomic improvenient. The Siamese peasant lives too easily. Increasing populatiou will make him wish to improve his methods. He also dies too easily. Much human misery can be eliminated by an imrmovement of the common medical treatment. A strong and determiued boruation is One of the bases of a great nation. Since they left interior Central Asia, the Sianese have been developing towmrd a great nation. The reople are competent. They are an intelligent and caPabe stock. It will be an asset to the family of nations to have Siam rise higher in the ranks of natronal grours. A <1popuiation and a deffrmination>1 can achieve this. The populatiOn and the determination will come together. The details coneerning the achievement of this have been grven in the Chapter on Health. The sPirit of the commercial economy can only come through the developmen of commercial institutions, principally a strong internal credit system and improvements in marketing. The flow of credit and funds is the flow of the life-blood of a nation. Each item of credit or funds ia but a corruscle conserving and carrying the economie matter iu and out of the business tissues. The spirit of eOmmercial life and the spirit of capitalism muat come into the lives of the people through their Own develOrment Banks could be established on every corner. But if the depositors and the borrowers do not arpear equally from the masses, the banks will do no good. The people are now lending and borrowing from each other. Under a more highly develOped system, they will lend more and borrow 319 more fromeach other and use carital no raridly and more efficient- It <1cannot be done from above. It must come by a development>1 of <1thc people. It>1 must <1be safty one.>1 It <1must be financially>1 <1sound.>1 It can be guided from above but finally the change must come within the lives of the people. Tho third essential is an agricultural and technical educa- tional system. This is not a college or a school. It is a whereby leaders are trained and sent among the masses to give them a sti1nulus and to guide them in technical progress. Siam needs a <1junior Doctor>1 system to put the health informiation into the hands of the people and see that they use it. The country also needs a <1Junior Agriculturalist>1 system to put the agricultural techniique already in the hands of the leaders and specialists among thc masses of the peoplc. The chart given the followiug rage shows the essentials of the plau. This chart is not perfect. It should be changed aud inProved under Practical experience and trial. It does not outline the relationshirs to the veterinary work which is also agricultural. However, it does provide for several tyPes of persons whih must be necessary to any organization developed to do thc work needed. These are as follows :---- 1. An administrative head who rlans and directs the whole affair. He should be an executive with a real agricultural vision. 2. A group of specialists who guide and do the Original work. Some of these should be detailed to srecialize intO particular crops of importance, such as rice, cotton, tobacco, and perhaPs, reprer. The others specialize in problems, not crops. Thus one problem is plant breeding and another is agricultural chemis- try. These specialists all should be teachers in a college of agriculture. Their highest trained studeuts should received the degree of B. S. iu agriculture. 320 3. Four or five local admidiistratOrs to take care of the develorment of individual areaa. 4. junior Agricultural Agents. These <1Junior Agricultural Agents>1 shonld be farm boys, un- sPoiled by too much educatioa or too much contact with city life. should be given not more than oue or two years technical training iu agriculture and be rlaced as employees of the Govmninent in the <1AnipILur>1 or larger districts. Later these may be replaced by better men and some of the older ones retired to farming. These nien are to be directed by the central station following au intensive study of problems of the individual areas. 'They are to go among the farmers and demoustrate to them how to improve the agriculture. They cau call the peoPle together in the villages and <1show>1 them how to do things. After showing these men, the agricultural agents ahould return every ao often and <1.see>1 that it is done. They should teach the brighter of the Kamnan and Pu-Yai-Ban and use them to teach the people. It provides for a College of Agriculture in ChulalongkaI-ana University. This place is to develop the specialists needed. In addition, there should be a central experimental and demonstration ground and some local experimental and demonstration grounds. Further, there should be either a central agricultural school for the <1Jutior Agriculturalists>1 or three or four smaller ones in the provinces. It does not appear advisable to specify further, because the whole thing should be worked out by- exrerience. The Veterinary Department has already established something like this on a small scale in order to handle the rroblem of anireal diseases. The principles are important. 'these may be outliued as follows :---- 1. The staff shonld be of good men even if the expan- sion of the institution is slower. 2. The <1Junior Ariculturalists>1 must not be too highly trained because they would be spoiled. 3. The supervision of the <1Junior Agriculturalists>1 by the cxperts should be constant and severe. 4. As high a proportion of the whole organization as possible should be Siameae but rigidly selected. Very five foreigners can stand country life in thc trorics. cf efficiency by the ideal of IMj ROVED SIAMESE AGRICULTURE AND BETTER COUNTRY L1FE. A twenty-five to forty years of developmeut of these tree policies should seedGthe following achievments :---- 4. A diversified agriculture with dry as well as wet crOrs. 5. A doubling of the material standards of living of the people. 6. A strong internal credit and marketing system. 8. The actual cultivated area of wet rich: land increased by a third or a half. 9. Cultivated area increased by at least three times. national