MANILA — Malacañang on Monday said that cheaper imported rice distributed by the National Food Authority (NFA) has arrived at the Subic Port but has yet to be released due to the incessant rains brought about by typhoon “Domeng” last week.
In a Palace briefing, Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said that the Department of Agriculture (DA) has confirmed that 250,000 metric tons of rice from Vietnam and Thailand has arrived and will soon be available for purchase in the market.
The new rice stocks aimed to boost the NFA’s depleted rice stocks were imported through the government to government (G2G) mode, which the agency deems faster than the government to private (G2P) mode.
Roque said that the imported staple will be priced at PHP36 to PHP38.
“Commercial rice is now at PHP36 to PHP38 as a result of the arrival of the 250,000 metric tons of NFA rice from Subic,” Roque said in a statement.
Roque clarified that the imported rice has yet to be unloaded and delivered but once it does, it will be priced even lower.
“However, the rice in Subic has yet to be unloaded because of last week’s incessant rains. Once unloaded, it will be sold at NFA price of PHP 27 to PHP 32,” he added.
Roque, meanwhile, expressed optimism that the prices of rice will soon drop since the imported rice can now be used to boost the NFA’s nearly depleted stock.
He echoed the remark of Department of Budget and Management (DBM) Secretary Benjamin Diokno, who earlier said that the higher prices of rice are due to the NFA’s “incompetence” in declaring a rice shortage.
“Secretary Diokno has been firm that it was gross incompetence for NFA not to have purchased rice during harvest time to ensure na meron silang (that they have) stock,” Roque said in a Palace briefing.
Diokno earlier said that the NFA did not heed the advice of economic managers to let private companies import rice, which would have cut down prices.
Roque clarified that he was not “justifying” the policy of importing rice but noted that the NFA should have purchased enough rice for its stockpile.
He said that the government’s overalls strategy to push for rice tariffication to solve the country’s rice problems by removing unnecessary government intervention in the rice market.
By Azer Parrocha