Statistics Office. New technologies have also pushed up the entry cost of rice farming and made it harder for farmers to own their land and produce rice. Many farmers have turned to loan sharks to sustain their operations. In 2015, nearly 150,000 farmers borrowed 21.59 billion baht from these lenders, according to the Provincial Administration Department. Farm debt, mostly incurred by rice farmers, added up to 2.8 trillion baht in 2017. Of Thailand's 21.3 million households, 7.1 million households are farmers. Almost four million Thai households are in debt; 1.1 million of those debtors are farm households. Farmers who already had large scale operations or could afford all the new chemicals, rice strains, and tractors benefited greatly while the average peasant was turned from a land-owning rice producer to a manual laborer on the farms of others. Yingluck government's rice scheme Campaigning for the office of prime minister in 2011, Yingluck Shinawatra pledged to support rice farmers with a plan to purchase rice at above market prices. In June 2011 rice prices were at record highs and Thailand was the world's leading exporter. The Yingluck promise was to buy unmilled paddy rice at 15,000 baht per tonne and premium hom mali rice at 20,000 baht per tonne, prices 50% or more above the market. The government moved to "buy every grain of [Thai] rice" and store it. This, it was thought, would cause world prices to spike. The Thai government would then sell the stockpiled rice at record prices for a profit. Yingluck was elected in September 2011. One week later India lifted its ban on rice exports. of Indian rice flooded the market. Vietnam then lowered its prices. Global prices plummeted. A year later Thailand was no longer the leading rice exporter, dropping to number three after India and Vietnam. Thailand had stockpiled of rice that could not be sold at prices covering the purchase price, administration, and storage. Somporn Isvilanonda, a researcher at the Knowledge Network Institute of Thailand, estimated that the government had to sell its rice for at least US$800 (25,000 baht) a tonne to recoup a pledged price of 15,000 baht a tonne. But white rice in 2012 was selling for just US$575 a tonne, and Vietnam sold its rice at only US$450 a tonne. In June 2013, the international credit rating firm, Moody's, brought the scheme's results to the world's attention, reporting that the