Hontiveros to economic managers: Justify need to raise rice buffer stocks
Senate Deputy Minority Leader Risa Hontiveros during one of the Senate hearings. Senate PRIB file photo / Voltaire F. Domingo
MANILA, Philippines — Sen. Risa Hontiveros on Wednesday asked the economic managers of the Marcos Jr. administration to explain the need to raise rice buffer stocks ahead of the dry spell caused by the El Niño phenomenon.
In a statement, the opposition senator questioned the suggestion of the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) to immediately augment the milled rice inventory in warehouses of the National Food Authority (NFA) as it pushed for “prepositioning” supplies of the agricultural commodity to ensure availability in provinces with dwindling supplies and rising food inflation.
READ: Neda: Boost rice buffer before start of El Niño
“Maybe the economic managers should more rigorously justify why raising the stock of rice in NFA warehouses makes more sense than other programs that could protect families that might experience loss of livelihoods and hunger. It should first ensure that there is allotted aid for the struggling Filipinos,” Hontiveros said partly in Filipino.
She traced back to the 2016 El Niño season, when the cost of rice rose along with the increasing buffer stocks for the agricultural commodity.
“The problem is the poor people have no means to pay,” the legislator pointed out.
Hontiveros also cited the Kidapawan bloodshed in North Cotabato, when drought-hit farmers demanded government assistance when the dry spell devastated many of their farm lands.
They had then clashed with police officers, killing two farmers and wounding 13 others.
READ: Bloodshed in Kidapawan: Climate change, conflict, politics of famine
“The violence in Kidapawan should never happen again just because we don’t want to open the warehouses to those who are hungry,” Hontiveros said.
She also said that if the NFA rice buffer stocks were to be boosted, it would be better for the staple grain supply to come from local producers.
“Neda is right in saying propositioning NFA rice stocks should only be done for select localities – the isolated ones that may face shortages and price surges,” the legislator added.
Hontiveros took note of reports that sanitary and phytosanitary clearances had already been issued for over three million metric tons of rice imports of the private sector.
Around one million of this has arrived in the country which, she said, “should be enough to fill the expected shortfall in local production.”
“Likewise, we know that the price of fertilizers has already gone down dramatically and the budgets for inputs and irrigation for the rice sector have been more than doubled for this year,” Hontiveros said.
According to the state weather bureau, El Nino is likely to develop from July to August and may persist until 2024.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has ordered the creation of a government team tasked to chart a plan on mitigating the impact of the looming El Niño phenomenon.
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