The National Food Authority (NFA) needs P9 billion in additional funds to be able to comply with the increase in the national rice buffer stock mandated by the amended Rice Tariffication Law (RTL), Administrator Larry Lacson said yesterday.
The agency was initially allocated a P9-billion budget for buffer stocking this year based on a nine-day requirement, but it is now required by the amended RTL to keep a buffer stock sufficient for 15 days of national rice consumption.
NFA’s request factored in the increased price per kilo of palay procurement, Lacson said.
The national rice consumption is currently averaging at 37,000 metric tons (MT) daily and the six days of additional reserve will require NFA to increase its purchase volume, thus needing additional funds, Lacson said.
NFA intends to buy approximately 300,000 MT of palay from local farmers at an estimated price of P23 per kilo, Lacson said,
Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said the NFA’s palay procurement should ideally account for up to 20 percent of the country’s domestic production or around 4 million MT compared to the current rate of only around 3- 4 percent.
“The NFA used to be a market maker—both a buyer and seller of rice. Now it is restricted to buffer stocking and buying rice from local rice farmers,” Laurel said. He is also chairman of the policy-making NFA Council,
“We aim to restore its influence on palay pricing by purchasing more local rice, helping to boost Filipino farmers profitability,” Laurel said.
Meanwhile, the NFA Council on Tuesday approved a resolution that will enable the NFA to sell rice to local government units (LGUs) for the purpose of disaster preparedness.
NFA must ideally release around 25,000 MT of rice every month to LGUs without jeopardizing the buffer stock needed to respond to emergencies or calamities in order to stabilize rice supply and prices.
Based on DA’s monitoring of public markets in the National Capital Region, local well-milled rice sold for P40 and P55 per kg last Tuesday while regular milled rice went for P37 to P48 per kg.
Imported well-milled rice was selling for P40 to P52 per kilo while the price of imported regular milled rice ranged from P38 to P48 per kg.
Special variety imported rice fetched P52 to P60, and premium rice, P51 to P58.
Special variety local rice was selling for P55 to P63 per kg while premium rice went for P48 to P58 per kg.
