The Economic Impact of Public Rice Research in Thailand

Abstract

This study provides a measure of the current state of technical knowledge determined in part by current and past public investment in rice research. With respect to the technical knowledge, rice production function is estimated. The result reveals that the improvement of technical knowledge enhances the land productivity and also leads to the changes in rice production structure. Since rice planted areas are expanded along with the employment of agricultural manual workers, the cost is no doubt increased. The public rice research represents a crucial driving force for encouraging the growth of production. Further, the social welfare deriving from public investment in rice research is estimated by using Marshallian concept. The result reveals that the cumulative economic surplus is quite high. As a consequence, the B/C ratio implies that those investments generate a benefit of 6.92, 6.25 and 5.68 Baht for every Baht spent by 5, 10 and 15% discount rate, respectively.