DA sees rice emergency declaration Tuesday
Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said the National Price Coordinating Council’s (NPCC) has released a resolution recommending a rice emergency and the government may make the declaration on Tuesday.
“My office just received the resolution yesterday while I was still in the [United States], which I have to sign as part of the board,” Tiu Laurel said on the sidelines of the signing of the memorandum of understanding between the Department of Agriculture (DA) and grocery store chain operator MerryMart Consumer Corp.
“Then, probably by Tuesday, we will likely be declaring the rice emergency,” he added.
The DA needs to thoroughly review the NPCC resolution and once such a declaration is made, the rollout of National Food Authority (NFA) buffer stocks may occur as early as Wednesday.
Tiu Laurel said he will convene a meeting with the NFA, the Food Terminal Inc. (FTI) and Kadiwa personnel to iron out the details of rice distribution.
“That is very welcome because it will reduce the volume of stocks stored in warehouses and farmers will also be happy because the NFA will be able to buy rice from them because there is enough storage,” the agriculture chief told reporters.
“And releasing 300,000 metric tons of rice to the market within six months, I think, will soften the market and hopefully rice prices will go down a little more,” he added.
The grains agency earlier said the monthly release of approximately 30,000 MT would alleviate high rice prices and decongest NFA warehouses in time for the upcoming palay procurement season.
Once the declaration is made, the NFA’s rice stocks will be sold to government agencies and local governments at P36 per kilogram and consumers at P38 per kg.
‘No emergency’
The Federation of Free Farmers (FFF) said the imposition of a food security emergency on the staple food is a bit too late as retail prices have started stabilizing and there is no emergency to address.
“RTL (Rice Tariffication Law) says there should be an extraordinary increase in prices in order to declare an emergency. But retail prices now, although still high, are either stable or slowly going down,” FFF national manager Raul Montemayor said in a Viber message.
“There was an extraordinary increase in the first few months of 2024, but that was almost a year ago. Why declare the emergency only now? Why wait for Feb. 4?” he said.
Montemayor expressed doubt that this declaration will be successful in lowering retail rice prices.
“It is clear that there is no current emergency, but they need the declaration so that they can legally unload NFA stocks (not only aging but all stocks) in an attempt to bring down retail prices,” he added.
Montemayor also said private traders will not be able to compete if the NFA’s prices are too low, as they will incur losses, making this exercise ineffective.
On warehouse congestion, Montemayor proposed moving stocks to warehouses in other locations where there is little inventory or procurement to accommodate incoming harvests.
The Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) signified its support for the looming emergency declaration since Executive Order No. 62 signed by President Marcos last June failed to tame rice prices.
“The emergency declaration is also an admission of an abnormal situation of unjustified high retail price [of rice]; authorities should now run after those that profiteered in the high retail prices of rice and charge them under the Anti-Agricultural Economic Sabotage law,” Sinag executive director Jayson Cainglet said.
The DA is empowered by the amended RTL to declare a food security emergency on rice in case of a supply shortage or extraordinary increase in rice prices.
The agency has been floating the idea of declaring an emergency to address elevated rice prices despite the issuance of EO No. 62, which slashed the import duty on rice 15 percent until 2028 from 35 percent to augment local supply while managing retail prices and easing the inflationary pressure of commodities.
