Rice price hike not temporary as gov’t claims, says farmers’ group

A man walks past at the commercial rice in front of a warehouse in Dagupan Street, Tutuban in Manila on Sunday. Commercial rice prices are expected to go up by P1 to P2 per kilo during the lean months beginning this June according to National Food Authority (NFA) said.  NINO JESUS ORBETA/INQUIRER

LUCENA CITY, Quezon, Philippines—The militant farmers group Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) on Monday criticized the National Food Administration (NFA) for allowing the P2 rise in the per kilo price of rice, raising fear the increase would not be temporary as claimed by the government.

KMP chair Rafael Mariano, in a statement, said the NFA should stop fooling the people as prices never returned to their pre-price hike levels after successive increases in July and September 2013.

Local rice consumers also hit the government for allowing the two-peso price hike.

“What happened to the rice self-sufficiency program of the government?” Lydia Damasoa, a retired school teacher, asked the Philippine Daily Inquirer at the city market here.

She said the P2 hike was “unacceptable and unjust.” Mariano blamed the rice cartels’ alleged manipulation for the increase, accusing President Aquino of being the “biggest protector of rice cartels”for his failure to control the prices of the primary food of Filipinos.

The KMP leader dared Presidential Assistant on Food Security and Agricultural Modernization Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan to rollback rice prices, dismantle the rice cartels and push for the reversal of the government’s agricultural trade liberalization policy.

Mariano found as “highly questionable” the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics’ statement that the country’s rice inventory was sufficient for 73 days.

“Rice cartels are aware that rice in government bodegas (warehouses) are not enough and that the big bulk of the stock inventory includes those already in the local market and households,” he said.

On Sunday, Malacañang assured the public that the increase in rice prices would be “temporary.”

The Department of Agriculture and the NFA attributed the P2-increase to “market forces” or the movement of supply and demand, Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said.

Coloma said once the harvest and planting season starts, the supply of rice would increase and push down prices.

Last year, Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala repeatedly claimed that the country would be able to produce 20 million metric tons of rice and that the country would meet its target of rice self-sufficiency.