Boosting NFA buffer stock to take years

President Duterte’s latest directive to the National Food Authority (NFA) to increase its rice reserves to up to 60 days may take two years to happen, according to the country’s agriculture chief.

Since the recent rice shortage on the part of the grains agency, the President has given it three directives—reorganize its management body, increase its buffer stock, and hike its buying price for palay (unmilled rice).

According to Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol, the NFA, which is now under the supervision of the Department of Agriculture (DA), might not be able to accomplish these tasks immediately.

“We may not be able to achieve the buffer stock [of 60 days] right away, but we are hopeful by the first quarter of 2020, we should already be at that level,” he said.

Asked whether the agency has the logistics to fulfill Mr. Duterte’s orders, Piñol only said they would “do their best to follow the President’s directive.”

The secretary noted that the order of the President was done in “good judgment,” adding that the effects of climate change would eventually deplete the rice supply all over the world.

“This actually conforms to the recommendations made by pertinent bodies due to the effect of climate change because we will never know when El Niño might hit us. That’s how the President thinks, he understands this. He knows that uncertain climactic conditions may lead to us being struck by El Niño in 60 days … What if even our suppliers get hit too?” Piñol said in a mix of English and Filipino.

Under the law, the NFA is mandated to maintain a rice buffer stock for 15 days at any given time and for 30 days at the onset of the lean months, based on the country’s daily consumption rice requirement of 32,150 metric tons (MT).

For the agency to reach a level of buffer stock enough for 60 days, it would need to store some 1.9 million MT of rice, but according to NFA Administrator Jason Aquino, the agency’s current warehouses all over the country could store only up to 22 days’ worth of the staple.

Aquino recommended that the NFA rent warehouses from the private sector as it has done before in instances where it could not store its supply, while Piñol suggested purchasing silos.

Historically, previous administrations have dropped the idea of renting warehouses to store NFA rice as it only inflated the debt of the agency.

The NFA has also made use of silos in the past, but these were eventually sold since the agency’s supply could not fill the storage.

Silos are huge structures that are often used to store bulky grain materials.