By Butch Fernandez & Cai U. Ordinario
SEN. Francis N. Pangilinan pressed the alarm button Tuesday following reports that palay prices fell to as low as P7 per kilogram in some areas and prodded the Duterte administration to “act as equalizer.”
Pangilinan also urged the President to implement the Sagip Saka Law, which will allow farmers’ and fishers’ organizations to enter into negotiated purchases with local government units and national government agencies.
“As Filipino rice farmers suffer from plummeting selling prices of palay [unhusked rice], the government to act as equalizer and implement the Sagip Saka Law immediately,” he said in Filipino.
A former food security secretary in the previous administration, Pangilinan noted that the Sagip Saka Law “exempts local governments and national agencies from the Procurement Law and allows them to directly buy” from farmers’ and fishers’ organizations for their feeding program, their employees’ rice allowance, and their food-for-work programs.
For instance, the senator said, local governments provide rice allowance usually in the form of cash. These can consider 20 percent of this allowance in the form of rice.
“Rice should be bought from local farmers. That is additional support for our farmers. The purchase of rice at a negotiated price will ensure that farmers will not incur losses,” he said.
Pangilinan said farmers and farmer-rights advocates told senators at the hearing that buying prices for palay dropped to as low as P7 per kg to P8 per kg, much lower than the production cost of P12 per kg.
He also recalled Romeo Royandoyan of Centro Saka expressing shock over the data of the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA), which indicated that the farm-gate price of palay was at P17 per kg.
Addressing PSA, Pangilinan urged the agency to “review your data because the results of your monitoring are different from those experienced by our farmers on the ground. The report until last night is that in Nueva Ecija, palay was priced at P8 per kg.” Pangilinan said “before the rice trade liberalization law was implemented, the price of palay was at P20 per kg. After it became effective, why did the price go down to P12, P9 or P8 [per kg]?”
Assistance
Senator Cynthia A. Villar, presiding at Tuesday’s hearing of the Senate Committee on Agriculture and Food on Republic Act 11203, prodded officials to assist those affected by the entry of more rice imports.
Villar told the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development and Mechanization to use the remaining P2 billion from the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF) to help farmers in the provinces of Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Iloilo and Negros Occidental.
She reminded National Food Authority (NFA) Administrator Judy Carol Dansal to tap their P7-billion annual budget to buy the palay of farmers.
LGUs aid farmers—DA
In a separate statement, the Department of Agriculture (DA) said LGUs in six rice-producing provinces had committed to help farmers affected by the drop in farm-gate prices of palay.
The DA said the provincial governments of Isabela, Nueva Ecija, Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, La Union and Pangasinan committed to raise P1.6 billion to prop up palay prices.
The funds will bankroll their direct engagement in the rice industry from palay-buying, drying, milling to rice marketing.
“With the buying price of palay at 14-percent moisture content set at P17 per kilo, these six provinces could procure roughly 91,176 metric tons of palay from farmers this wet season harvest,” Agriculture Secretary William D. Dar said.
“Further, using the current national palay harvest average of roughly 4 metric tons per hectare, the P1.6 billion additional fund from the six provinces could make about 27,000 small rice farmers and their families happy,” Dar added. The DA said the largest commitment was made by Pangasinan Governor Amado Espino, who is allocating P300 million for the farmers, followed by Nueva Ecija Governor Aurelio Umali, P250 million.
Dar said Ilocos Norte Governor Matthew Marcos Manotoc, Ilocos Sur Vice Governor Jeremias Singson, and La Union Vice Governor Mario Ortega committed to allocate P200 million each.
In his recent visit to Cauayan, Isabela, Dar said the province has been directly buying palay from its farmers in recent years. Dar encouraged officials of other provinces he visited to do the same.
On Monday, Representative Estrellita B. Suansing of the First District of Nueva Ecija told a hearing at the House Committee on Agriculture and Food that rice prices in her province have already dropped to P7 per kg.
No official data—Neda
However, National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) Assistant Secretary Mercedita A. Sombilla said this has not been confirmed by official data released by the PSA.
Based on the latest PSA data, Sombilla said dry rice prices average P17 to P18 per kg and wet rice, P13 per kg to P14 per kg.
Villar asked farmers to list the areas where palay prices are low so that the NFA can buy their crop at P17 per kg. Recalling a testimony by Arze Glipo of the National Movement for Food Security, Pangilinan said small rice farmers earn only P27,000 per cropping or P54,000 every year.
He said the income of farmers is the benchmark of other countries for government interventions in the agricultural sector. “In other countries, such as Vietnam, China and Thailand, the income of farmers is used as a gauge in determining the effectiveness of government interventions.”
Pangilinan said the billions of pesos spent by the government for various agricultural programs mean nothing if these will not improve the income of farmers.
He also said he shares Dar’s vision to double farmers’ income.
Image credits: Roy Domingo