Organic rice industry in Cambodia Presented by: Farmer and Nature Net

Current Situation of organic rice in Cambodia ( 2011) No of producer group: 322 groups, from 322 villages, 94 communes, 28 districts, 7 provinces Total members: 2668 members Land area for organic rice production: 1,283 ha Amount organic rice produced in 2011: 1,200 t Amount supplied to CEDAC shop: 840 t

CEDAC and FNN are providing technical support in term of rice farming technique ( SRI), forming organic rice producer group and network, and create the market for organic rice product The product is supplied to local market and international market ( Germany, USA…)

Initiative of key stakeholder Farmers are interested to produce organic rice as it also reduce production cost and can be sold at higher price NGOs: providing technical support in term farming technique, form the group and looking for the market for theproduct Consumer: support local organic product Government: support the forming of organic rice and encourage farmers to do organic farming

Issue and challenge Irregular rainfall Drought and flood Pest outbreak Lack of market and marketing actors Limited participation of farmers in value added High standard requirement for the product to be exported

Impact of 3 global issues Land right: – Land grabbing: farmers sometimes lose their productive land – Low production and low quality products – Conflict occurance and migration Climate change – Drought and flood  rice yield will go down – Pest break which lead to low rice yield – Cause high production cost – Failure farming business – farmers won’t do it again next year

Food price volatility – Positive impact: farmer will be able to sell their rice at higher price – higher income – Negative impact: farmers will expense more money on food which they can’t produce

Opportunity High demand of organic rice both in and outside country Many people start to be aware and trend to consume organic products There are some existing market channel for organic rice The government support and exporting rice to abroad is also government’s strategy

Action plan and recommendation Organic rice should be promoted country wide Link all producer group into cluster and union Farmers should involved in this industry and form themselves into network Local and national authority support the industry NGO should provide more capacity building training related to value added

Government should re-check the policy of land investment ( esp. land concession) Government should rehabilitate the existing irrigation system and build the new ones where there is lack of irrigation system Government should facilitate to find the loan or provide loan to farmers with low interest rate to ensure that farmers will have enough financial resource to invest in this industry Both government and NGO must try to look for and expand the market for organic rice products.