Agriculture Secretary William Dar has ordered the National Food Authority (NFA) to bring down rice prices to P27 per kilo by flooding Metro Manila markets with 3.6 million bags of the staple grain.
Dar also directed the agency to increase palay support price to P19 from P17 per kilo.
“The NFA Council (NFAC) met and there are a number of big developments in relation to palay procurement and price of rice in the market,” the agriculture chief said during the press conference held at the Philippine Coconut Authority (PCA) in Quezon City.
The agriculture head said the NFAC decided for the NFA “to flood Metro Manila markets and other key cities nationwide with imported rice.”
“3.6 million bags of imported rice will be out in the market for one month.”
“(Some) 3.6 million bags of imported rice will be out in the market for one month starting Sept. 12. All bags will be up until October 10,” he added.
Dar said the NFA rice will be sold at P25 per kilo wholesale, and P27 per kilo retail.
When sold at the retail price of P27 per kilo, the 3.6 million 50-kilogram bags will amount to P4.86 billion, which the NFA can readily use to buy from farmers, he said.
“The P2 increase in palay price support could translate to P8,000 additional income per farmer.”
Dar said the P2 increase in palay price support could translate to P8,000 additional income per farmer, based on current national average yield of four tons per hectare.
“Palay buying by NFA to farmers will now be at P19 per kilo from P17, pero wala na ang incentives (but no more incentives),” he said.
The NFA currently buys palay at P17 per kilo support price plus P3 per kilo as buffer stocking incentive.
This brings NFA’s maximum buying price for clean and dry palay to P20.70 a kilo for farmer cooperatives and P20.40 per kilo for individual farmers.
“We would like to believe that flooding the market with 3.6 million bags of imported rice will have an impact in lowering (the price of rice in the market),” Dar said.
Earlier, the DA chief has secured the commitment of some 30 provincial governments to buy palay from their farmers directly.
Dar said the Land Bank of the Philippines will launch a new loan facility for local government units (LGUs) for them to buy palay directly from their farmers.
The DA is also set to forge an agreement with the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), in which the DSWD will give beneficiaries of its Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps) rice instead of P6,000 cash as part of its condtional cash transfer scheme.
“We are also working with DSWD to convert the P6,000 conditional cash transfer (CCT). We hope that the money could be used to purchase palay. (About) P28 billion (will be the) rice subsidy under 4Ps,” he said.
The DWSD has the option to buy either from the provincial governments and the NFA, giving farmers an assured market for their produce either way, Dar added.
During a meeting recently, Dar, who heads the NFAC, said the NFA was also directed to undertake a comparative palay production cost study per region to come up with basis for more responsive and precise rice and palay pricing policies to be set by the NFAC.