Assessing farmers’ adoption of ethylene stimulation in increasing Para rubber production in Ban Khai District, Rayong Province

The study found that only 50 percent of the trained rubber farmers have adopted the use of ethylene stimulation. Several factors that contributed to non-adopters’ hesitance are perceived uncertainties of technology attributes, cost of implementation, and farmers’ attitudes. From these factors, the increasing cost was the recurring reason expressed by farmers during the focus group discussion. Furthermore, a review of related studies revealed that there was an inadequate R&D investment in the rubber industry. Therefore, government supported in boosting the R&D of the country’s rubber industry would require an immediately action and implementation that competed to rubber export countries for rapidly gaining in the competition.