Potential effects on rural economies of conversion to sustainable farming systems: A case of Sa See Moom rice farmer group, Kamphaengsaen, Nakhon Pathom province

Most of what the farmers use in the area drawn heavily on the high-input conventional farming practice is found being exceeded over the low-input or sustainable farming practices. This is indicated in terms of productivity, on-farm income, food security, employment opportunity and gross margin. This, of course, partially may be due to the practices originally benign under conditions of the farm-level impacts of low-input rice and other various crops planted for the farm household economies including non cash income, assets and non-cash costs have not been quantified to enable to bring about the productive capabilities and enhance resilience of individuals, groups and organizations to deal with rapidly changing economic and social circumstances resulting from their own unique needs and preferences. The hypothesis testing, under low-input farming practices, indicates that there is a statistically significant difference in income and employment opportunity due to the land at 0.01 and 0.05 levels respectively. The rest variables including labor, capital, management, and market are found being statistically non significant to cause difference at 0.05 level. Land is accounted for causing 71.0 percent and 13.8 percent of the variation in income and employment opportunity respectively. Similarly, technology is found being a statistically significant to cause difference in cost at 0.05 level. Technology is accounted for causing 14.2 percent of the variation in cost. Under high-input farming practices, out of the variable categories: land, labor, capital, management and market, only land and technology are found being statistically significant to cause difference in income at 0.01 and 0.05 levels respectively. The combination of land and technology is accounted for causing 67.7 percent of the variation in income. Land is also found statistically being negatively significant to cause difference in cost at 0.05 level. Land is accounted for causing 15.6 percent of the variation in cost. None of the output variables, including productivity, income, food security, employment opportunity and cost, is being statistically significant to cause difference in farmers acceptance. The findings suggest that continued research-extension-application in insuring essential functions to generate information and organic technologies as effective substitute of chemical inputs, effective policies to support the farmers decision making to adopt sustainable farming technologies, wise use of land and farming technologies by the farmers to increase income and employment opportunity and implementation of effective extension technique such as training courses, demonstrations, field trips, and group discussions related to sustainable agriculture are some essential recommendations in order to facilitate the adoption of sustainable farming system in the future.