Introducing Liliane Phantharangsi, our Summer Intern!

The Community for Agroecology Foundation (CAEF) is happy to welcome our new summer intern, Liliane. Here is her first blog post:


Hi everyone,

First of all, let me introduce myself. I’m Liliane, a french student who work with CAEF (formerly SFS) as an intern. I arrived in Surin the 1st July 2011 and I will stay three months. I’m studying agronomy for sustainable development so that’s why I’m here in Surin. To understand the challenges of sustainable agriculture in developing countries such as Thailand I will observe all along my stay how CAEF makes things change and helps strengthened "Green Community." I have known and contacted this organization thanks to this blog. So here I am, in Surin : the city of elephants.

My first month will consist in observation all the activities that have been set up by CAEF. Thus, I will update this blog as often as possible. I want to apologize for my bad English.

The first thing I saw when I have started working here is the Saturday Green Market. One of farmers’ initiatives was to sell their food excess (vegetables, fruits …) so they though of an alternative way to sell it. With the help of CAEF, they built the Green Market in 2003. It has given the opportunity to farmers to sell their fresh organic products and to meet directly the consumers. Now we count more than 80 farmers that sell every Saturday in the Green Market. In addition to that, the mobile green market in Prasat district has developed. Once, I went to sell traditional homemade cake in front of Prasat Hospital with a farmer, she said to me that "it is a good way to earn money quickly." During one morning, she can get around 1500 THB ($50).

CAEF has also an other alternative market : the Kao Hom grocery. It promotes organic products. Every Thursday, Farmers come to deliver their fresh products and within two hours, consumers have bought almost everything.

The alternative market is a platform that build intimate relationship between farmers and consumers.

However there are still some challenges to overcome. For example, farmers are biased by the non-organic products that are invaded the Green Market. In fact, the current place of the Green Market is next to the traditional Saturday market so consumers can be confused. CAEF is now negotiating with the local authorities to find the best solution for stopping this conflict between the Green Market and the traditional market.


I have also been in the countryside for one week. P’Samrat who has kindly opened is house for me is the chief of farmers’ groups in Donlengthai village. Since ten years now, the farmer group use organic practices with the help of CAEF. They banned chemical pesticides and has been using organic fertilizers (chicken manure). For the first time of my life, I had replanting the rice, it was a hard work because the weather was really hot. But this is the daily condition of farmers here, in Surin. Even if they are poor and they work hard, I found that people were really nice to me and I can feel their happiness every day. They cooked me some delicious dishes that we shared with all the family and the neighbors.

The night before I left, with P’Samrat we talked about the agriculture future in the village. He told me that, nowadays our children don’t want to be farmers anymore, they studied in University downtown Surin or in big cities (Mahasarakham, Bangkok) and left the countryside. He is still wondering who will take care of his rice crops. He was smiling and told me "I will plant rice until my last breath."