pay up to 13,000 baht per tonne to growers who store their rice until rice prices gradually recover. Production and exports Thailand's rise to prominence as a rice producing nation was due to increased production of rice in northeast Thailand. While in the past, central Thailand was the main producer of rice, northeast Thailand quickly caught up. This was in part due to new road systems connecting northeast Thailand to ports on the coastline. Villages that produced significant rice crops were also changing as farmers evolved from more subsistence practices to mostly wage labor. Exchange labor also virtually disappeared. Working animals were replaced by farm tractors and irrigation technology was updated in most villages. The green revolution was just starting to bloom in the world's farm fields. Rice farmers and merchants took advantage of new rice varieties, strains, fertilizers, and other advances. The International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) disseminated knowledge, technology, new rice strains, and other information to rice producers in Thailand. From the 1950s to 1970s, rice production per unit of land increased by almost 50%. Thailand exported of milled rice valued at US$5.37 billion in 2014, then the highest figure in its history. Rice exports in 2014 represented an increase of 64% in volume and 22% in value compared to worth US$4.42 billion exported in 2013. Exports declined in 2015, to , worth US$4.61 billion, making it the world's second leading exporter of rice behind India, at . Vietnam was third, exporting . Exports in 2016 amounted to . In 2017, Thailand exported of rice, an all-time record, up 14.8% year-on-year. Sales revenue rose 15% to 168 billion baht. Of its total annual exports, 70% is commodity-grade white rice and the remainder is hom mali. Some special grades such as riceberry contribute a small quantity. The country exported in 2018, but the number plunged to less than in 2019. The decrease is attributed to the strong baht, floods and drought, and increased competition, according to the Thai Rice Exporters Association. Thailand's rice export forecast for 2020 is . Ubon Ratchathani Province is the nation's leading rice-producer. It earns more than 10 billion baht a year from rice sales. Thailand's Future Forward Party has pointed out that, rather than exporting rice solely as a commodity product, it makes more sense to add value to the rice at home and export the resulting product. They point to indicia rice. Thailand