The farmgate prices of unmilled rice in Central Luzon—the country’s rice granary—ranged from P19 to P21 per kilogram, an official of the Department of Agriculture (DA) said over the weekend.
The prices of dry palay in the region were higher than the average of P18.21 per kg recorded by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) in the first quarter of 2022.
Crispulo Bautista, director of DA-Region 3, said the agency monitored palay prices in the region’s seven rice-producing provinces.
Bautista said the average farmgate prices of fresh or newly harvested rice ranged from P16 to P17 per kg.
Rice traders in Intercity Industrial Estate and Golden City Business Park in Bocaue/Balagtas towns in Bulacan, which are considered as major rice trading centers for Metro Manila residents, said the average dried palay prices range from P23 to P24.50/kilo depending on the quality and variety.
At these prices, average production costs for a 50-kilo sack of rice with 60 percent recovery translate to P1,763.33 to P1,878.33 or an average of P35.27 to P37.57 per kilo, according to the traders.
These figures, they said, do not include the mark-up prices of wholesalers and retailers.
Farmers in Central Luzon are currently harvesting their dry season crop.
Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) recently said subsidizing rice will enable President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to make good on his promise to reduce the retail price of the staple to P20 per kilogram.
The group said, however, that strategies for pulling down the retail price of rice must not depress farmgate prices.
“We can lower the retail cost of the rice if we can introduce interventions that would lower the cost of producing palay, cut postharvest losses and remove non-productive players in the whole rice supply chain,” Sinag Executive Director Jayson Cainglet said.
Sans subsidy, retail prices of the staple range from P42 to P46/kilo in other stores. The average farmgate price of rice has reached P23/kilo.
“Farmers are encouraged to produce rice because prices are attractive this cropping season,” Cainglet said in the vernacular.
Data released by the PSA in January showed that the output of the crops subsector in 2022 fell by 1 percent year-on-year due to the impact of typhoons on farms and reduced application of planting inputs by farmers because of higher than usual costs.
Palay production last year declined by 210,000 metric tons (MT) to 19.75 million metric tons (MMT) from the record-high volume 19.96 MMT posted in 2021, PSA data showed. Corn output, likewise, fell by 45,000 MT to 8.255 MMT from 8.3 MMT in 2021.