Sugar imports ahead of SRA order questioned
Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) | FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — A shipment of sugar from Thailand arrived in the country a week before the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) approved the importation of 440,000 metric tons (MT) of the agricultural commodity, Sen. Risa Hontiveros bared on Tuesday, describing that incident as “government-sponsored smuggling.”
Hontiveros said it was the Bureau of Customs (BOC) that flagged the entry of the imported sugar when the shipment arrived at the Port of Batangas on Feb. 9, or six days before the SRA’s issuance of Sugar Order (SO) No. 6.
“Since these are not covered by SO 6, there is no other conclusion but to say that these sugar shipments are smuggled,” the senator said in a media briefing. “What other conclusion can be drawn other than that this is government-sponsored smuggling?”
Hontiveros presented documents showing the timeline of events, the officials who signed the papers, and the entry of the sugar shipment without going through the BOC’s rigorous inspection.
Timeline
During the briefing, Hontiveros said documents showed that All Asian Countertrade Inc. was the registered consignee of the shipment, contained in 260 units of 20-foot shipping containers aboard three vessels.
In a letter that the BOC received on Feb. 14, Assistant Agriculture Secretary James Layug asked Customs Commissioner Bienvenido Rubio that the Department of Agriculture (DA) be allowed to conduct a joint inspection of the containers.
Layug also requested Rubio to issue an “automatic alert order” for all the subsequent shipments of All Asian.
Hontiveros said the arrival of the imported sugar was apparently connected with a draft and undated memorandum supposedly issued by Agriculture Undersecretary Domingo Panganiban directing the SRA to present a sugar importation plan.
Panganiban also told the sugar board to “allocate” the importation to three importers—All Asian (250,000 MT), Sucden Philippines Inc. (100,000 MT) and Edison Lee Marketing Corp. (100,000 MT)—“upon the instructions” of Mr. Marcos “thru” Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin.
Many questions
In a separate letter on Jan. 13, Panganiban informed Michael Escaler, chief executive of All Asian, that his company was allowed to import 250,000 MT of sugar “per instructions from [Bersamin].”
The agriculture official said the sugar to be imported “shall not be made available in the domestic market unless reclassified” by the SRA.
Hontiveros pointed out that Panganiban sent the letters well ahead of the issuance of SO 6 on Feb. 15, and that the imported sugar should arrive in the country no earlier than March 1.
“Why am I belaboring these dates and timelines? Because it seems that there are people who are jumping the gun,” the senator said.
“Can a sugar order be retroactive to cover shipments that arrived before its effectivity date and before the notice of award allocation?” she asked.
“If the answer is no, then the sugar shipments that arrived must be confiscated immediately as smuggled sugar and its importers blacklisted and criminally charged with violation of the Anti-Agricultural Smuggling Act,” Hontiveros suggested.
Sen. Risa Hontiveros (File photo from the Senate Public Relations and Information Bureau)
The senator also questioned Bersamin’s authority to approve sugar importation, noting that such power was solely given by law to the sugar board.
“Is the letter allegedly signed by Panganiban authentic? I hope not. If it were genuine, top officials of the DA and Malacañang, who are both the right-hand men of the President, should clarify many things,” she said.
Worse, Hontiveros said the sugar shipment was given VIP treatment as it was allowed to enter through the BOC’s “super green lane” system that exempted it from the rigorous inspection of customs personnel.
Doubt
An official of the agriculture department expressed doubt on Hontiveros’ disclosure, while a member of the SRA board said the senator might have confused the shipment with a different method of importing sugar other than the SO system.
“Hindi naman siguro (It is probably not true),” Agriculture Assistant Secretary Rex Estoperez told the Inquirer.
SRA board member Pablo Luis Azcona said Hontiveros might have mixed this up with three new importers that were recently allowed to import sugar through the minimum access volume (MAV) mechanism.
A document from the DA identified the importers as Agro Bulk Marine Corp., Leslie Corp., and San Fernando Eric Commercial Inc.
In December last year, President Marcos, who concurrently sits as Agriculture Secretary, ordered expediting the entry of 64,050 MT of refined sugar through the MAV to address high sugar prices.
MAV is the minimum import volume of a particular commodity committed by countries to the World Trade Organization to facilitate global trade. The scheme is designed to address the protectionist policies of some countries that bar imports to safeguard their local industries.
‘Not covered by any order’
United Sugar Producers Federation president Manuel Lamata said he was not aware of the issues surrounding the sugar importation.
“What I know is that it has not arrived yet in the country because [SO 6] is not yet in effect.”
Meanwhile, National Federation of Sugarcane Planters (NFSP) president Enrique Rojas said, when reached for comment, that his group has received reports since last week about the arrival at the Batangas port of “5,000 MT of imported sugar from Thailand.”
“The shipment arrived even before Sugar Order No. 6 was released. In other words, this shipment is not covered by any sugar order and is thus smuggled sugar,” he said.
He added: “This importer has the courage to bring in imported sugar even before Sugar Order No. 6 was released. The importer seems to have advance information on the signing of the sugar order, and this importer seems certain that he will receive an allocation from the importation under Sugar Order No. 6.”
“Perhaps this importer is one of the rumored favored traders who will corner the allocation for the 440,000 MT importation,” Rojas said further.
He also expressed suspicion that “[t]his shipment of smuggled sugar might not be an isolated case. Perhaps Sugar Order No. 6 is only a smoke screen to hide the entry to other numerous shipments of smuggled sugar.”
“If our apprehensions are proven true, this will spell doom for the sugar industry and the millions of Filipinos dependent on the sugar industry for their livelihood,” Rojas said.
