Abstract:
This research aimed at alleviating both Thai farmers' lifestyles and the organic rice consumers in safety. The objective was to develop a curriculum for rice farmers in shifting paradigm from chemical to organic farming which is the national agenda declared by the Thai cabinet on June 23, 2005, regarding policies on reconstructing agricultural produce to eradicate poverty and to make implicit local wisdom in Thai rice culture into explicit knowledge. Data collected were documents from both agricultural field studies and curricula in Rajabhat Universities, human resource development programs for agricultural staff sponsored by the Ministry of Agriculture and Corporatives. Instruments used were interview schedules, survey instruments and questionnaires. Data were analyzed by content analysis and factor analysis. Results of the study were: (1) Organic farming related to community service by Rajabhat Universities were directed to students and community leaders in traditional delivery by lecture, training programs and academic conferences. (2) Best practices in organic rice farming exphasized Thai rice cultural knowledge, improvement of agricultural knowledge in villages and stressing priorities in management, marketing and productivity. (3) Best practices in accordance with Thai rice culture were Thai local wisdom, attachment between the monarch as an institution and Thai rice farmers, self-contained lifestyles, reliance on the supranaturals and resistance to urban domination, land and water sources development and modern technology. (4) The curriculum for training Thai farmers in organic rice farming was developed from factor analysis resulting in 4 modules, namely, production, funding, marketing to increase productivity from the total cycle management and Thai rice culture. As for instruction, five approaches were laid bare, namely, agricultural reconstruction policies, authentic assessments, integration of organic rice farming with the Thai rice culture, differential learning in formative evaluation and self-directed summative evaluation. (5) A quasi-experimental study was conducted to test viability of the curriculum with thirty chemical rice farmers as subjects. The training was conducted at the Northeasten Development Foundation, Amphur Muang, Surin Province. The pretest and posttest scores of subjects were statistically significant at 01. After one month, a follow-up study was conducted and discovered continuous concrete application of the training in terms of preparation. Among recommendations suggested were development of a curriculum with the total cycle in Rajabhat Universities for regular students and application to train grassroot occupations. Furthermore, a consortium between Rajabhat Universities and relevant ministries in research and development according to the national agenda was encouraged.