(First of two parts)
With the government’s inevitable shift to a rice tariff regime and the perceived failure of the National Food Authority (NFA) to fulfill its mandate, now comes the debate on whether or not the agency should finally be reformed.
Since its establishment under the Marcos administration in 1972, the NFA has operated with the same regulatory and proprietary function. Forty-five years later, policymakers, officials of the agency and industry groups all agreed there was a need to rethink the agency’s role in ensuring food security.
“The problem of the NFA goes way back. This is systemic,” said Sen. Cynthia Villar, chair of the Senate committee on agriculture and food, during a Senate probe on the agency. “We need to resolve the problem that is NFA because it’s been causing all our problems.”
The issue on the agency’s alleged incompetence was highlighted by its announcement to the public that it had only two days’ worth of buffer stock left—way below its mandate of a 15-day buffer—that led consumers to panic with the thought of a rice shortage on a national scale.
Aside from this, the agency also failed to buy enough palay from local farmers that would have enabled it to stabilize rice supply and prices, as its current buying price for palay at P17 a kilo could not compete with prices offered by private traders.
The situation was perfect for opportunistic private traders. Hence, prices of rice shot up weekly as demand surged. Reports from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed the average retail price for regular milled and well-milled rice now at P39.55 and P43.38 a kilo, respectively. These were 6.63 percent and 4.3 percent higher than the levels in the same period last year.
As NFA stocks continued to dwindle, the agency stopped distributing subsidized rice in the market. This left some 10 million Filipinos known to consume the rice variant—including farmers —with no other affordable options left.
Bigger problem
Myrna Rodriguez, from the secretariat of the Asia-Pacific Network for Food Sovereignty (APNFS), said the solutions to NFA’s problems were dependent on its policymaking body, the NFA Council.
The agency’s hands were tied that it could not make a move without the body’s approval. Thus, the agency was not able to raise its palay buying price even if it wanted to.
“The power to fulfill its mandate resides on the banks/financial institutions-dominated NFA Council, whose framework of development is everything that contradicts the voice of poor Filipinos,” she claimed.
“The perspective of the farmers cannot even enter the discussion. They don’t understand what is happening on the ground. Farmers are caught up with the lack of capital and the government is not helping. How can they help when there is no one representing the farmers? Even if there is, what is one representative against numerous economic managers?” she added in Filipino.
There is reason for Rodriguez to believe that farmers’ concerns were being ignored.. Of the 17 members that comprise the NFA Council, six represent banks (two each from the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, Landbank of the Philippines and Development Bank of the Philippines), six from economic agencies (two each from the departments of finance and trade and industry and the National Economic and Development Authority), and three from the Office of the President. The two remaining spots are given to the agency itself and the farmer sector. Also, there is no representative from the Department of Agriculture despite its direct correlation with the agency.
An official from the NFA who declined to be identified agreed there was this irregularity, adding that decisions of the council often became outdated or irrelevant by the time they were implemented as officials mostly relied on data from the PSA released a week after they were collated.
“Even if the council finally reaches a decision, it would take days or weeks before this is relayed to the ground. By the time it reaches the farmers, other problems already cropped up or their problem has already worsened,” the official said. “To be honest, they cannot reach a good decision without seeing what is really happening to these farmers.”
To be concluded