With the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) recently revealing that inflation has hit 6.4 percent this August, House Appropriations Committee Chairperson Rep. Karlo “Ang Probinsyano” Nograles on Wednesday urged members of the National Food Authority (NFA) Council and NFA management led by NFA Administrator Jason Aquino to “set aside their differences, end the finger-pointing, and work collectively to address the rice supply problems that have contributed to inflation.”
BSP Governor Nestor Espenilla Jr. on Tuesday called on the government to do something about food supply to address inflation, saying that “an unfortunate confluence of cost-push factors continue to drive consumer price inflation in August beyond the acceptable target range. Much of it has to do with food supply shocks. Rice in particular. These warrant more decisive non-monetary measures to fully address.”
According to Nograles, “there are two disappointing things we learned when we asked members of the NFA Council and NFA’s management team to appear in the House last Monday: first, that neither want to take responsibility for the problems we have regarding rice supplies and prices.”
“Their inability to work cohesively explains why the NFA has not been able to properly perform its mandate to maintain a 30-day buffer stock of rice.”
“Second, that their inability to work cohesively explains why the NFA has not been able to properly perform its mandate to maintain a 30-day buffer stock of rice and to provide the market with more affordable NFA rice,” added the legislator from Davao.
“The NFA performs such a critical function that what it does or does not do impacts on the lives of our countrymen, especially our kapwa probinsyano.”
During the hearing on Monday, NFA management admitted that it had failed to hit its palay procurement targets because its P17 buying price could not compete with prices offered by local traders. NFA management said since last year they had asked the NFA Council to increase the buying price, but it had failed to do so, despite informing Committee members that the Council meets once a month.
Upon learning of this, Nograles directed the NFA Council to immediately act on the recommendation of the NFA management to increase the buying price of palay.
“The NFA performs such a critical function that what it does or does not do impacts on the lives of our countrymen, especially our kapwa probinsyano who, when rice supplies become limited, have to pay absurdly high prices to feed their families,” stressed Nograles.
“Now even the BSP––which, ironically, is also a part of the NFA––is saying that rice supplies, specifically, are contributing to inflation. So, whatever internal issues the NFA Council and management have, they should deal with them and do their jobs dahil maraming umaasa sa kanila.“
Nograles said NFA leadership “should not wait to be called to Congress to act on urgent matters like this. Kung di ko pa sila kinompel na desisyunan ang buying price ng palay, baka di pa sila umaksyon dyan.”
