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ZAMBOANGA
CITY—The
city government, through the Local Price Coordinating
Council (LPCC), has created a rice-monitoring team to
identify reasons of inexplicable increase in the price
of rice in this city.
The LPCC,
chaired by Mayor Celso Lobregat, created the monitoring
team during a meeting Tuesday where they tackled the
problems that this city faces with respect to the price
of rice.
Lobregat
said part of the monitoring team mandate is to pinpoint
the possible causes of the price crisis and to monitor
warehouses, traders and retailers for any hoarding
violations.
The
monitoring team will be headed by the Department of
Agriculture (DA) and will be composed of representatives
from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the
National Food Authority, Grains Retailers’ Association,
Philippine National Police (PNP) and the consumer group.
The
rice-monitoring team was created based on the provisions
of Republic Act 7581, otherwise known as the Price Act,
or the “Act providing protection to consumers by
stabilizing the prices of basic necessities and prime
commodities and by prescribing measures against undue
price increases during emergency situation.”
The
increase in the price of rice has been mostly attributed
to the continuous oil price hike.
It has
been observed that the price of commercial rice in this
city has increased from P25 per kilo early this year to
as high as P45 a kilo recently.
NFA
assistant regional director Rolando Maravilla has made
an assurance during the meeting that this city has ample
supply of rice and would last for the next 59 days.
Maravilla said what the city is facing is a price
crisis, not rice crisis, citing the selling price,
especially of commercial variety, has gone up to almost
P50 a kilo.
DTI
regional director Nazrullah Manzur has expressed
concerned that the supply of rice in this city is not
stable because local rice traders competes with
businessmen of nearby provinces in acquiring stocks.
Earlier,
DA regional director Oscar Parawan disclosed that some
of the harvested rice from Zamboanga Sibugay, Zamboanga
del Norte and Zamboanga del Sur are being brought to
Ozamis and Lanao del Norte due to the transport cost.
Zamboanga Sibugay, Zamboanga del Norte and Zamboanga del
Sur are considered as the rice granary of the region
since vast track of lands in the three provinces are
planted with rice.
Parawan
said, without mentioning any amount, that it is costlier
to transport rice to this city compared with Ozamis and
Lanao.
Grains
Retailers’ Association president Alex Go disclosed that
the local rice traders have managed to acquire rice
stocks to be sold during the leans months that start
this month. |
