World food crisis turns rice into gold

Until a few months ago, Booncherd Leekasem would never have been caught astride a muddy tractor or squelching through buffalo dung in a rice paddy.

As a headman of Khao Ngam in central Thailand he had far more respectable things to attend to, such as organising village affairs and running the restaurant where his wife serves her famous crispy catfish salad.

Mr Booncherd rented his 14 hectares (35 acres) of land to poor relatives and let them endure the backbreaking labour of planting, weeding and harvesting the rice.

This year all that has changed and now Mr Booncherd gladly spends his days in the fields beneath the tropical sun. "In the past, when kids in school were asked what their father did, they would be ashamed to say, 'He is a farmer'," he says. "But now being a farmer is nothing to be ashamed of —- we can be proud of what we do."

All over the country, Thais are returning to the paddies like prospectors chasing gold. After a global surge in the price of grain, a gruelling, unglamorous occupation has become highly lucrative.

The economic opportunities have also brought risks as farmers get deeper into debt, fight over scarce water resources and are forced to defend their fields from a new breed of rice bandit.

Thailand's 20 million farmers find themselves at the centre of an unprecedented surge in global food prices — a "silent tsunami" in the words of the UN World Food Programme —- that is threatening starvation for millions.

Its causes are multiple. A newly affluent middle class in countries such as China and India is increasing demand for food at a time when more and more crops are being diverted toenvironmentally friendly biofuels.