The role of farmer organizations and networks in the rice supply chain in Thailand

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of rice supply chain in the context of the role of rice farmer organizations and cooperative networks in Thailand. Design/methodology/approach - Primary data were solicited from the cooperatives and members of cooperatives for this study through questionnaire administration. The questionnaire containing a five-point Likert scale was posed to respondents to ascertain their problems before and after joining the network (for cooperative) and after joining the cooperative (for members). This study employed the independent two-sample studentt-test (two-tailed) to test for significant difference in the means of scores regarding the problems of cooperatives before and after the cooperative network, and also to test for significant difference in the means of scores of the problems of members of the cooperatives before and after joining the cooperative. Findings - The study revealed that key production and marketing problems such as increased transaction costs and market uncertainties confronting the cooperative organizations have been diminished as a result of the networks. Key problems of the members of the cooperatives such as exploitation and opportunistic behavior of traders to whom they sell their products have been reduced as a result of joining the cooperatives. Research limitations/implications - This paper is not without caveat. The governance structures in relation to leadership, financial arrangements and bargaining power balance have not been analyzed in this study and these are avenues for further research. Originality/value - To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first that examined the combined roles of farmer organizations and cooperative networks in developing the rice supply chain in Thailand.