Thongkham Inprom has been farming for more than six decades, growing jasmine rice and sticky rice in Chiang Rai. The 71-year-old harvests about 60 tonnes each year and keeps 1 per cent for his family. The rest is sent to a rice mill and eventually sold in central Thailand. But now he is worried that he might not be able to sell his rice. Government agencies have found arsenic in the soil and water at his farm. It is already affecting his crops. While his brown rice contains arsenic within the safety limit, his paddy is “right at the safety threshold”, said Somporn Pengkam, the director of the Community-led Health ... (full story)