3 weeks ago
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MANILA, Philippines — A maximum suggested retail price (SRP) of P49 per kilo of imported rice will take effect on Saturday amid efforts to reduce rice prices, according to the Department of Agriculture (DA).
The rice max SRP will be implemented only in Metro Manila, key cities and other urban centers, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said yesterday.
“In many provincial areas, we’ve seen imported rice prices already lower than the max SRP, so we will apply it more selectively,” he said.
Imposing a max SRP was necessary as the retail price of imported grains reached P64 per kilo despite a 20-percent tariff cut, Tiu Laurel noted.
“We will review the numbers in the coming days to determine if there’s room to lower the max SRP further. As of now, there could be scope for additional reductions, but we’ll have to see,” he said.
Initially set at P58 per kilo on Jan. 20, the rice max SRP decreased to P55 per kilo on Feb. 5 and P52 per kilo on Feb. 15.
The landed cost of five-percent broken imported rice dropped to $490 per metric ton on Feb. 21, from $550 per MT.
The retail price of imported special rice ranged between P55 and P62 per kilo; imported premium rice, between P49 and P57 per kilo; imported well-milled rice, between P43 and P46 per kilo and imported regular-milled rice, between P36 and P46 per kilo, based on the DA’s monitoring of Metro Manila markets.
Farmers’ group Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (Sinag) welcomed the reduced rice max SRP.
With the current price of five-percent broken Vietnam rice at $380 per MT, imported rice should further go below P40 per kilo, Sinag executive director Jayson Cainglet said.
Declaring a food security emergency and imposing a max SRP were necessary government interventions following the dismal failure of tariff cuts to tame rice prices, Cainglet noted.
“It is the right time to call for the repeal of Executive Order 62 and generate revenues from imported rice that is earmarked to support rice farmers,” he said, referring to the measure that reduced tariffs.
Global rice prices, he said, have plummeted significantly, dropping by $146 per MT, from $568 on July 10, 2024, to $380 metric ton this month.
Rice import policy hit
The government’s tariff cuts and unlimited rice importation are to blame for the severe drop in the farmgate price of palay nationwide, former agriculture secretary Leonardo Montemayor said yesterday.
“Farmers in Mangaldan, Pangasinan have postponed selling their palay due to traders’ low buying prices. In San Jose, Occidental Mindoro, prices of newly harvested palay have dipped to as low as P13 per kilo,” he said.
Based on Bureau of Customs data, Montemayor said at least 4.8 million MT of rice arrived in 2024, making the country the world’s biggest rice importer.
“Another 331,000 MT entered last January, resulting in a supply glut coinciding with the start of the dry season harvest,” he noted.
Clean-and-dry palay is valued at P19 per kilo, with traders hesitating to buy stocks due to the influx of imported rice in the market, he said.
“The National Food Authority (NFA) has not been procuring clean-and-dry palay from farmers at the announced price of P23, since its warehouses are still full of stocks from previous harvests,” he noted.
In Occidental Mindoro, about 5,000 sacks in Sablayan and 3,700 sacks in San Jose have been deteriorating in NFA bodegas since 2022, Montemayor said.
For his part, Federation of Free Farmers national manager Raul Montemayor said traders are hedging against a continued drop in rice prices due to the aggressive implementation of the rice max SRP and disposal of NFA rice through local government units and Kadiwa outlets at a subsidized rate of P33 per kilo.
Montemayor is pushing for the restoration of the 35-percent tariff on imported rice to influence local traders to buy farmers’ palay at better prices.
Tomato price drops to P4 per kilo
Farmers should coordinate with field offices of the DA amid reports that tomato retail prices have dropped to P4 per kilo, Agriculture spokesman Arnel de Mesa said.
“If you have many tomatoes, you should coordinate with municipal agriculturists or our regional field offices. They will help them market their produce either in the nearest markets or Kadiwa outlets in the region. We will find ways. They should not throw their harvest,” De Mesa said.
The farmgate price of tomatoes in Pangasinan and Nueva Ecija has fallen to as low as P4 per kilo amid the peak harvest of tomatoes, according to Sinag.
