CITY OF SAN FERNANDO – The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) has accused rice cartels of price manipulation which it cited as the only possible cause of the recent rice price hikes, as it challenged the Aquino government to dismantle the cartels.
The KMP also asked Pres. Aquino to “immediately order a rollback in rice prices.”
KMP Secretary General Antonio Flores said “rice farmers do not see any justifiable reason to increase rice prices by one to two pesos because we have an abundant harvest for the first half of 2013. Even palay prices remain very low despite the high costs of production shouldered by our country’s rice farmers.”
”Five days ago, the Department of Agriculture was boasting of a bountiful harvest in palay. After two days, the prices of rice already shoot up by more than P2,” noted Flores.
Flores cited DA Assistant Secretary Dante De Lima, who is also the National Rice Program coordinator, as saying earlier that palay harvest may increase by two percent in January to June this year from 7.892 million metric tons a year ago.
”The price of our palay has not increased and our harvests are good. We see no other reason for rice price increase but the rice cartel,” he said.
A report from the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics indicated that the price of regular milled rice ranged from P32 to P34 a kilo as of July 9, up from the P30 a kilo since last year.
Flores pointed out that “the manipulation in rice prices could be meant to justify the continuation of the policy of massive rice importation.”
He said ”rice cartels are also the rice importers who benefit from the government’s rice importation policy or legalized rice smuggling.”
“At the same time, they are the rice smugglers or at the minimum have connections with rice smugglers,” he also said.
Flores lamented that “our local rice industry is being killed by the policy of massive rice importation and the flooding of smuggled rice. These are the main culprits in the rice cartels’ arbitrary increase in rice prices.”
“We urge the Aquino administration to dismantle rice cartels in the country and put a definite stop to the rice importation policy, order a rollback on rice prices, and institute price control measures,” the KMP leader said.
“We can’t even afford the rice that we ourselves planted and harvested,” he added.
Flores also warned that “the release in the local market of the tens of thousands of metric tons of smuggled rice seized in Cebu (600, 000 sacks) and Legazpi City (93,952 bags) now being auctioned by the Bureau of Customs could worsen the situation.”
“Putting the smuggled rice into auction will only fuel impunity. The rice smugglers will only laugh at government because the so-called auction will legitimize the illegal entry of the contraband rice.
At the same time, releasing hundreds of thousands of sacks of smuggled rice in the local market will definitely have a tremendous impact on the prices of our locally produced rice,” he said.
“Instead of bidding out the smuggled rice we demand the Aquino government to distribute the confiscated rice to ‘Pablo’ survivors and to the poor for free,” said Flores.
