Docs from Jerry Lee

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nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 05:36:30 +0000

Carabao

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 09:41:21 +0000

Pimped Photo #29

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 06:41:56 +0000

Not my photo!, original by Varin
www.ipernity.com/doc/varin/3117317
Submitted to "Let´s play! Pimp my photo #29"
www.ipernity.com/blog/jochen/97656

Original size available upon request, I cannot upload large sizes on a free account ...

The Land of Smiles?

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 05:11:08 +0000

21 images, Stitched Panorama

This region of Thailand is near the elbow-bend of the great mother of river - Mehkong , underneath this rice field is a layer of potash (the largest field in Asia), then natural gas, then OIL!!, no wonder its not been promoted, no wonder they've not tried to preserve the numerous ancient buddhist relics, fossil fields. 30 km southeast of this spot locates archaeological findings dating back to stone and bronze age societies of S.E. Asia.

... some people just can't live without their SUVs ...

we have technology to land people on Mars and the Moon, for a tiny fraction of any defense budget, we can have ELECTRIC VEHICLE technology - and forget about Oil ...
example #1 - TH!NK sustainable mobility : www.think.no

Today ...

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 15:34:23 +0000

The crop is unusual because its multiple shots blended and stichted together.

Phu Phoilom

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 05:12:42 +0000

Phu Phoilom means mountain of gentle breeze, this is 30km south of Udon Thani, N.E. Thailand. An 18 shot blended panorama.

Forest Temple - Wat Pah Ban Khor

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:02:31 +0000

An organic Buddhist community 30km north of Udon Thani, N.E. Thailand.

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nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 03:59:11 +0000

OyY

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Sat, 23 Aug 2008 02:49:02 +0000

The Rice Paddy

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 03:52:47 +0000

Long-term irrigation project does not offer short-term political gain... because it requires years for the results of any irrigation project to be realised. Issan villages that face annual droughts and are dubbed "chronic drought-affected villages". Thus, the villagers are forced to wait desperately for money handouts (vote buyings) from politicians.

Many of the younger generation have decided to leave their farms to find jobs in the cities; they feel too insecure to continue on the land, because of the unpredictable nature of the weather year in year out.

... Is this year's weather condition any better? and what about next years?

The Village Rice Mill

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 03:52:32 +0000

This is the oldest rice mill in the village of Ban Donwai, the wood used is of an indigenous hardwood dated over 40+ years ago, the mill operates on a crop-share basis and produces only for local self consumption ...

Personal Rice Mill

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 03:52:13 +0000

The Finance Ministry will review the use of millions of rai of land owned by the Treasury Department.
www.nationmultimedia.com/2008/04/23/headlines/headlines_30071332.php

... The move is a bid to bring the land into production as part of a broad strategy to deal with the food crisis. It follows instructions from the Cabinet, which also approved a budget of Bt10 billion to tackle the national food crisis systematically over the next 12 years.

.. The government will encourage farmers to grow more oil palm, cassava and other fuel crops. In addition, it will also focus on creation of irrigation systems, to ensure water supplies. The Charoen Pokphand (CP) Group, the country's biggest agribusiness conglomerate, yesterday said the government needed to spend Bt200 billion to develop irrigation systems in order to ensure future farming was sustainable.

CP said other national plans would benefit from the development of irrigation systems. Montri Congtrakultien, CEO and president of CP's crop-integration business group, said the government should use skyrocketing commodity prices to invest in irrigation development, because the cost remained low.

== It's easy to do speadsheet to forecast the growth in future profits, especially when dealing with corporate giants

... Long-term irrigation project does not offer short-term political gain, because it requires years for the results to be realised. Some villages face annual droughts and are dubbed "chronic drought-affected villages". Thus, the villagers are forced to wait desperately for money handouts (vote buyings) from politicians. ... Many of the younger generation have decided to leave their farms to find jobs in the cities; they feel too insecure to continue on the land, because of the unpredictable nature of the weather year in year out ..

Re-Planting

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 03:51:58 +0000

World Food Program warns of 'silent tsunami' of hunger

By DAVID STRINGER – LONDON (AP) —
Ration cards. Genetically modified crops. The end of pile-it-high, sell-it-cheap supermarkets.
These possible solutions to the first global food crisis since World War II — which the World Food Program says already threatens 20 million of the poorest children — are complex and controversial. And they may not even solve the problem as demand continues to soar.
A "silent tsunami" of hunger is sweeping the world's most desperate nations, said Josette Sheeran, the WFP's executive director, speaking Tuesday at a London summit on the crisis...

ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gVMIPi3dMFpmC3mUr_kNyximdCvwD9074TR00

Across Globe, Empty Bellies Bring Rising Anger
www.nytimes.com/2008/04/18/world/americas/18food.html?_r=1&fta=y&oref=slogin

Jasmine Rice - Khao Hom Mali

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:03:38 +0000

... China uses 440,000 tons of rice each day. “If we sold them every grain of rice we produced in the United States, what we export and use domestically, it would last them less than three weeks.”
.... Bob Papanos, vice president, U.S. Rice Producers Association

Ploughing of the field

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:02:52 +0000

.. There are two kinds of stories that we can tell about the food prices. One is an economic story, and that's a story about a perfect storm of poor harvests and a demand for meat in developing countries, which is diverting grain, and the high price of oil, which is driving up food -- farm inputs, and at the same time, the biofuels boom, the process of growing fuels in order -- sorry, growing food in order to burn it rather than eat it. All of these are economic factors that are driving up the price of food.

Re-Planting of Rice

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:02:23 +0000

Re-Planting of Rice

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:02:04 +0000

Multi-national Food Corporations
... if you imagine a sort of hourglass, at the top there are the millions of farmers who grow the food that we eat, and at the bottom there are billions of us consumers, and in the middle there are just a handful of corporations that mediate between the people who grow our food and us. And those corporations, in many cases -- it's usually four corporations controlling more than 50 percent of the market. I mean, in tea, for example, one company, Unilever, controls 90 percent of the market.

Now, when you're in that position of market power, you're able to do a great deal. First, you're able to drive prices down for farmers. And of course the irony there is that farmers and farm workers are the poorest people on the planet. So you're paying the poorest people on the planet the least. And then you're processing the food so that what we end up with is food that is rich in salts and fats and sugars, food that tends to make us want to buy more, food that makes us obese. And that's why you're having a situation where there are six billion people in the world, a billion of whom are now overweight.

The Rice Fields of Issan

nobody@ipernity.com (Jerry Lee) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:01:50 +0000

Rice could be even more volatile, since governments in many nations -- including across Asia's "rice bowl" -- consider rice not just a staple, but a national security priority.

What makes rice supply/demand special is that almost all of the crop is consumed where it is grown. Only six per cent of world rice is exported, compared with 17 per cent for wheat, the other main food grain.

"The largest producing countries in the world of rice and wheat are India and China, who are also the largest consumers. So if you get a hiccup in either of those countries, the game is over," Papanos said.

In general, supply worries have haunted world grain markets for the past year. Rising population coupled with booming demand for grain-based fuels like ethanol have fed worries about shrinking acreage devoted to food and feed grains.

Discouraged by slumping Wall Street stocks, a flood of "hot" speculative money has inflated grain futures. It now seems like rice has moved centre stage for speculators.

Key in coming weeks will be the impact of weather on crops in Thailand and Vietnam, which together account for half of all world rice exports.