NOTWITHSTANDING the desire of the Senate to abolish the National Food Authority (NFA) because of continuing losses and its inability to solve our rice supply problem, government did not dissolve the agency. Instead, its operation and supervision was transferred to the Department of Agriculture (DA) under Secretary Emmanuel M. Piñol, with its outstanding debt of P149 billion.
Inflation accelerated to 6.4 percent year on-year in August, the fastest in nearly 10 years based on 2012 prices.
With high inflation, the price of rice and other food products surged higher. The National Nutrition Council (NNC) warned of “nutrition insecurity” for our people. However, according to Nona Tad-y, regional nutrition program coordinator of NNC, we may shift to substitutes for rice to ensure nutrition. Corn or root crops could be a good substitute when rice is short. Backyard gardening for fruits and vegetables should also be encouraged at this time to increase food production and maintain proper nutrition.
Now that NFA is under the Department of Agriculture (DA), we recommend that the latter prioritize rice production instead of importation. NFA may gradually phase out its rice importation program and shift to local procurement. What measures should the government now take to encourage farmers to sell their produce to NFA?
For the last 10 years, NFA has been buying clean and dry palay from the farmers at only P17 per kilo even if the price offered by commercial traders is higher. It appears that NFA is not interested in buying palay from local farmers but prefers to import their rice stock. Even if there are price increases in practically all goods and services, NFA does not adjust its buying price from local farmers, but continue to pay higher for imported stock.
Again, we must refer Secretary Piñol to our column of Feb. 11, 2018, titled “PH should learn from India’s rice program”. We challenge him not to import any more rice for NFA now that the agency is under his department; instead he should launch a program for the agency to buy palay produced locally and pay DOUBLE of whatever is the prevailing price in the market at harvest time. This is what India did for its farmers. If we do the same here, Filipino farmers will plant palay even under their house, and we will lick our annual rice shortage!
As we were saying, Agriculture secretary Piñol must lead a mission to visit India and learn of their rice production techniques to feed a burgeoning population of 1.3 billion people, compared to ours of only 105 million.
If this article does not come to Mr. Piñol’s attention, we wish the local DA people can forward it to him. He will appreciate your effort and concern.
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Historical Quote of the Week
“The first community school program in the country was introduced in Iloilo by Dr. Jose V. Aguilar.” (For comments or re-actions, please e-mail to jnoveracompany@yahoo.com)/PN
