Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha and his cabinet ministers arrived in Suphan Buri this morning at the start of a two-day mobile cabinet meeting with a focus on development programmes and water management for the central region.
They were scheduled to visit Wat Pa Lelai Worawihan in Muang district this morning and inspect the construction of one of the replicas of the royal crematorium which are being built in every province.
In the afternoon they were to travel to Ayutthaya inspect a number of water management schemes and meet with the local business community ahead of Tuesday's cabinet meeting there.
The highlight is to be Gen Prayut’s visit to tambon Ban Paen to observe the release of water into rice fields after the harvest.
Dozens of farmers were reportedly gathering in tambon Ban Paen in Ayutthaya's Sena district to meet the prime minister in the afternoon. They planned to voice their concern about the Royal Irrigation Department's delay in releasing water into their fields, which are to be used as kaem ling (monkey cheeks) water retention areas help to control flooding from the North.
The rice farmers say they planned for an early harvest as required by the government's water management plan, but the RID had so far failed to release water into their rice fields as intended. According to the farmers an early harvest is bad news for rice prices. They get paid for fields used for water retention.
The Prayut administration plans to hold a mobile cabinet meetings in the provinces at least once a month, with the aim to cover all six regions of the country.
The previous mobile cabinet meeting was on August 21-22 in Nakhon Ratchasima with a focus on local economic development and infrastructure projects in the northeastern provinces.
