Thailand govt is considering a USD 1.4 billion soft loan program for agricultural cooperatives to purchase domestic corn at USD 0.24/kg. This is 37% above current market prices. The proposed soft loan program’s objective would be to raise the domestic price of corn. But there are concerns over the proposed program’s effectiveness as the difference between the purchase price and the market price is greater than the reduced interest rate. In October 2017, farm gate price of corn declined to USD 0.18/kg, down 3% from the same period in 2016.