Cabbage farmers in Chiang Mai’s Mae Wang District drove down into the city to sell their cabbages at only one baht per kg, drawing large crowds of buyers earlier today at the Northern Agricultural Product Centre.
Authorities limited each person to only 30 kgs.
Cherdsak Saetao, 30, a farmer from Mae Win, told CityNews that cabbage prices have dropped from 10 baht per kg last week to only 2-3 baht per kg this week, leading the agricultural centre to purchase 3,000 of Mae Win cabbages to subsidise and sell to the public and discount.
Other subsidised produce include tomatoes, kaffir lime, etc.
Many farmers in Mae Chaem say that the prices are so low that they are not even bothering with harvesting, instead choosing to use machines to destroy their patches so as not to allow cabbages to rot on the ground and attract insects.
According to Cherdsak, the reason the prices have dropped to this level is because of the excess vegetables now coming into Thailand from China on the new high-speed train from Laos, driving local prices down.