The Department of Agriculture (DA) said the government is still finding a way to distribute to markets and sellers the confiscated stocks of sugar and onion from recent warehouse raids.
“The Bureau of Customs (BOC) is still preparing its inventory that will be given to Executive Secretary Vic Rodriguez in order to learn what the government must do to fast-track the distribution of sugar in the country,” Domingo Panganiban, DA senior undersecretary, said during the Laging Handa briefing yesterday.
Panganiban said if proven to have been kept with irregularities, sugar stocks found in the warehouse raids will be confiscated and distributed to supermarkets and small sellers in order to be sold to the public at lower prices.
Apart from the sugar inventory report, the DA said it is also awaiting an inventory report on white onions from the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI).
“At present, the BPI is still crafting a report on the current supply of both red and white onions… There were at least nine trucks of white onions that were intercepted in Misamis Oriental that came from Manila. The BOC assures that if these are proven smuggled or hoarded to spike prices, these will be distributedto markets in order to be used by the public,” Panganiban explained.
Panganiban earlier said retail price of refined sugar may drop to as low as 60 per kilogram due to the efforts of select supermarkets to cap prices at P70 per kg and the use of additional supply found at the raided warehouses.
However, based on DA’s monitoring of 13 public markets in the National Capital Region, prevailing retail prices as of yesterday were at P95 per kg for refined sugar, a P5 drop from the P100 per kg recorded last August 25.
Prices of washed and brown sugar remained at P75 per kg and P70 per kg., respectively.
The Sugar Regulatory Administration millsite monitoring showed that composite price of raw sugar as of August 14 was at P2,970 per 50-kilogram bag.
On the other hand, there is no available retail price monitoring from the DA for both imported and local white onions as of yesterday.
Last week, Panganiban said more warehouse raids were set in Visayas and Mindanao apart from operations done in Bulacan, Pampanga, Zambales, Batangas and parts of Metro Manila that resulted in the discovery of allegedly illegally stored sugar stocks.
Meanwhile, among supermarket chains that agreed to sell P70 per kg sugar in Metro Manila starting last week include Robinsons, SM, Puregold and S&R Membership Shopping
The DA expects the supermarket cap to be in place until December of this year.
