THE Makabayan bloc on Wednesday filed a joint resolution that seeks to provide a P10-billion supplemental budget to the National Food Authority (NFA) and allow the grains agency to increase its palay buying price from farmers.
House Joint Resolution (HJR) 28 eyes to raise the NFA’s current support price for palay, now pegged at P17 per kilogram, to P20 per kilogram to be able to procure more this harvest season. “The supplemental budget shall provide the NFA [with means to procure palay from famers], without [necessarily] exonerating its officials of their unauthorized diversion of procurement funds,” the resolution read.
“It shall be exclusively used for procuring palay from local rice farmers for the period of September 2018 to January 2019 at an enhanced price of P20/kilogram,” it added. The measures under the joint resolution seeks to arrest the rising prices of rice in the market, which was caused by the depletion of the NFA’s stockpile earlier this year.
Image credits: Nonie Reyes