Government to compensate farmers affected by rescue mission of young Thai soccer team

BANGKOK, July 3 (TNA) - The Thai government, through the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, will support and provide financial compensation to local farmers affected by the ongoing rescue mission of a young Thai soccer team in Chiang Rai Province in the Thai North. Somchai Charnnarongkul, Director General of the ministry's Department of Agricultural Extension, told journalists of the policy, saying that his department is ready to provide a financial compensation of 1,113 baht per rai (2.5 rai = 1 acre) to local farmers whose rice fields or other farmlands have been found damaged by the ongoing rescue mission of the 13-member young Thai soccer team. Somchai stated that an initial survey has found a total area of about 1,397 rai of local rice fields in three localities of Chiang Rai's Mae Sai District have been flooded by flows of massive water released from Tham Luang Cave, where the young soccer team has been stranded for 10 days so far. According to the senior official, his department will also give rice breeding seeds for local farmers affected by the ongoing rescue mission. Besides, the Thai government reportedly plans to develop three locations that were dug for ground water during the rescue mission to become new natural water sources for the consumption of local farmers and other villagers. Meanwhile, the rescue mission, led by the Royal Thai Navy's Sea, Air and Land Teams (Navy SEALs) and joined by multiple parties including foreign volunteers, has successfully found the 13-member young Thai soccer team in the Tham Luang Cave in the compound of the Khun Nam Nang Non Forest Park in Mae Sai since late Monday night, but the mission has been carried on until the 12 young Thai soccer trainees, aged 11-16 years old, and their 25-year-old coach, will leave the cave home safely. (TNA)