Screenshot from RTVM/LIVE
MANILA, Philippines — President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. started his third State of the Nation Address (Sona) on Monday by admitting that the country’s economic gains mean little if the prices of commodities are high.
“The hard lesson of this last year has made it very clear that whatever current data proudly bannering our country as among the best performing in Asia means nothing to the Filipino who is confronted by the price of rice at P45 to P65 per kilo,” the President said.
“While the statistics are good, it means nothing to our countrymen who face the reality of high prices of food, particularly rice,” he added in Filipino.
Marcos said his administration understands the people’s concerns, assuring the public that the government is doing everything to address the problem.
“Sa kabila ng mga hamong ating kinakaharap, nasaksihan natin ang pinaka-mataas na ani ng palay sa bansa nitong nakalipas na taon. Pumalo ito sa lagpas 20 milyong tonelada, ang pinaka-mataas na ani mula no’ng 1987,” he added.
(Despite the challenges, we saw the country’s highest palay harvest last year. It was more than 20 million tons, the highest since 1987.)
However, Marcos said last year’s harvest was still short of the government’s target of 16 million tons of rice annually.
Lowering rice prices to P20 to P30 per kilogram was Marcos’ campaign promise when he ran for president in 2022. Two years into his term, a Pulse Asia survey showed that controlling inflation remains the top concern of Filipinos.
A report from Pulse Asia released last July 12 showed that 72 percent of Filipinos believed that controlling inflation should be immediately addressed by the Marcos administration. It was followed by increasing the pay of workers (44 percent), reducing the poverty of Filipinos (32 percent), creating more jobs (30 percent), and fighting graft and corruption in the government (22 percent).
READ: Controlling inflation still the top concern for Filipinos – Pulse Asia
Only 4 percent of Filipinos said in the same survey that the administration was able to lower rice prices.
READ: Only 4% of Filipinos think Marcos able to lower rice prices – Pulse Asia