The Industry Ministry will ramp up measures to discourage farmers from setting fire to their sugarcane fields to aid harvesting after a study found the smoke caused by the practice adversely impacts the health of about two-thirds of the nation's population.
Many sugarcane farmers burn their fields right before harvesting to get rid of the plants' leaves, which makes the crop easier to process. The practice produces "black snow" -- ashes that fall on areas surrounding the fields -- and vast amounts of ultra-fine PM2.5 dust, which pollutes the atmosphere.
Since 2021, the government has been giving sugarcane farmers 120 baht per tonne to discourage them from burning their fields to strip the leaves before selling them to sugar mills. As of September 2022, it had spent about 14.4 billion baht on the scheme, but burning continues, said industry permanent secretary Nattapol Rangsitpol.
About 17.61 million tonnes out of the 66.66 million tonnes -- about 26% -- of sugarcane sent to mills across the country in the 2020/2021 crop season were processed by burning.
In the 2021/2022 season, the percentage went up to 27%, with 25.12 million tonnes out of the 92.07 million tonnes of sugarcane sent to mills processed by burning. In the 2022/2023 season, about 30.78 million tonnes out of the 93.89 million tonnes of sugarcane sent to the nation's mills, about 33%, were processed by burning. About 3.08 million rai were affected, Mr Nattapol said.
"PM2.5 stays in the atmosphere a long time and moves in the direction of the wind. The smoke often blankets areas where about 44 million people live, namely Greater Bangkok, the Central Plains, East and Northeast regions, for about six months every year," he said.
Authorities will ramp up enforcement of related laws and introduce new incentives to persuade farmers not to burn their fields, he said.