The Democrat Party has vowed to offer better prices to rice growers with a plan to subsidise transport costs and offer higher profits under the next phase of the rice price insurance scheme.

Korbsak Sabhavasu, the party's strategy director for the election, said the transport subsidy would vary based on distance from Bangkok.

Farmers would be entitled to 200 baht per tonne of rice transported up to 300 kilometres from Bangkok, 400 baht for 301 to 600 km, and 600 baht per tonne for more than 601 km.

The party also pledged to raise the profit given to farmers by 10 percentage points from 40% of production costs given under the existing scheme.

Mr Korbsak said farmers were expected to enjoy an average price of 12,000 baht a tonne under the second step of the insurance programme, up from 11,000 baht a tonne insured under the existing scheme.

Under the guaranteed-income programme initiated by the Abhisit Vejjajiva government in place of the old mortgage scheme, farmers are compensated for the difference between the guaranteed and benchmark prices.

If the benchmark price falls below the guaranteed price, the government pays farmers the difference, with prices updated every two weeks.

The government has spent about 58 billion baht on the insurance price scheme that covers rice, maize and tapioca during the past two years.

The decades-old mortgage scheme was frequently criticised as a political tool to win farmers' votes.

Governments set mortgage prices as high as 30% above market prices, attracting huge amounts of paddy into state stockpiles. Most of it had to be sold at a loss.

The Pheu Thai Party recently vowed to reinstate the rice pledging scheme and promises to pay 15,000 baht a tonne for paddy if it wins. That is 36% higher than the current 11,000 baht farmers obtain from the income guarantee programme.

Mr Korbsak said other policies for the sector were in the pipeline, such as compensation for crop damage from natural disasters, a farmers' fund and cheap fertiliser supplies that match the cultivation requirements in each region.

Source: Bangkok Post