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THE Department of Agriculture (DA) said it is ready to intervene if rice prices become “unrealistically high.”

Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. issued the statement after the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) announced that rice inflation slowed to 5.1 percent last month from the 9.6 percent in October.

“If international rice prices continue to ease, the peso remains stable, and tariffs stay low, we would most likely see the price of well-milled rice decline further in the coming months,” Laurel said.

President Marcos Jr. had earlier slashed rice tariffs to 15 percent from 35 percent until 2028 as part of efforts to curb high retail rice prices.

“The DA [Department of Agriculture] stands ready to intervene in the market if rice prices remain unrealistically high, especially with the additional P5 billion provided by President Marcos to support the Rice-for-All and the P29 [per kilo of rice] program,” he added.

The agency recently rolled out the Rice-for-All program offering the food staple at P40 per kilo in several public markets across Metro Manila to provide cheaper rice options.

Initially priced at P45 per kilo, the rice under the program was recently reduced to P43 and was dropped further to P40 per kilo, with the goal of lowering retail prices that remain high despite easing global rice quotations and substantial tariff reductions.

The prevailing retail prices of imported well-milled and regular rice in selected Metro Manila markets is P45 per kilo, respectively, based on the DA’s latest price monitoring report. The local retail prices is P45 per kilo for well-milled rice and P42 per kilo for regular.

Veggies, meat costly

Meanwhile, figures from the PSA showed that vegetable and meat inflation accelerated to 5.9 percent and 3.9 percent, respectively.

Agriculture Assistant Secretary Arnel de Mesa said the string of storms that battered the country’s vegetable-producing areas and the persistent threat of African swine fever (ASF) pushed retail prices of the commodities.

Despite this, the DA official allayed concerns for the upcoming holidays, noting sufficient supply of key farm commodities like rice, vegetables, and meat.

“Our supply for rice this December is in good volume. Although we expect local production to decrease, we can expect our imports to reach as high as 4.5 million metric tons [MMT],” De Mesa told reporters in Filipino during a briefing on Thursday.

He added that the Philippines could expect over 100 days of national stock inventory by yearend, which would be enough to sustain the country until the next harvest considering the additional rice shipments coming in.

“We were assured of good supply of pork and chicken from our livestock stakeholders. There are no problems in the highland [vegetables], and while there was a slight shortage in the lowland [vegetables], it is now recovering, so we have no issues,” De Mesa said.

Source : businessmirror