Thailand’s Rice Bowl May Get Smaller as Farmers Curb Plantings
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Many Thais revere Me Posop, the rice goddess who guards humankind and rewards good stewards of her grain. Me Posop has been kind to Thailand in recent decades.
While its neighbors Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos struggled through war, Marxist-Leninism, and authoritarian rule, Thailand prospered from its new factories and rice exports. The nation surpassed Myanmar as the world’s top rice shipper in 1965. Last year, 9 million metric tons of Thai rice were exported around the world.