How our plants have turned into thieves to survive
Scientists have discovered that
grasses are able to short cut evolution by taking genes from their neighbours.
The findings suggest wild grasses
are naturally genetically modifying themselves to gain a competitive advantage.
Understanding how this is
happening may also help scientists reduce the risk of genes escaping from GM
crops and creating so called "super-weeds" - which can happen when
genes from GM crops transfer into local wild plants, making them herbicide
resistant.
Since Darwin, much of the theory
of evolution has been based on common descent, where natural selection acts on
the genes passed from parent to offspring. However, researchers from the
Department of Animal and Plant Sciences at the University of Sheffield have
found that grasses are breaking these rules. Lateral gene transfer allows
organisms to bypass evolution and skip to the front of the queue by using genes
that they acquire from distantly related species.
"Grasses are simply stealing
genes and taking an evolutionary shortcut," said Dr Luke Dunning.
"They are acting as a
sponge, absorbing useful genetic information from their neighbours to out
compete their relatives and survive in hostile habitats without putting in the
millions of years it usually takes to evolve these adaptations."
Scientists looked at grasses -
some of the most economically and ecologically important plants on Earth
including many of the most cultivated crops worldwide such as: wheat, maize,
rice, barley, sorghum and sugar cane.
The paper, published in the
journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,
explains how scientists sequenced and assembled the genome of the grass Alloteropsis
semialata.
Studying the genome of the
grass Alloteropsis semialata - which is found across Africa,
Asia and Australia - researchers were able to compare it with approximately 150
other grasses (including rice, maize, millets, barley, bamboo etc.). They
identified genes in Alloteropsis semialata that were laterally
acquired by comparing the similarity of the DNA sequences that make up the
genes.
"We also collected samples
of Alloteropsis semialata from tropical and subtropical places
in Asia, Africa and Australia so that we could track down when and where the
transfers happened," said Dr Dunning.
"Counterfeiting genes is
giving the grasses huge advantages and helping them to adapt to their
surrounding environment and survive - and this research also shows that it is
not just restricted to Alloteropsis semialata as we detected
it in a wide range of other grass species"
"This research may make us
as a society reconsider how we view GM technology as grasses have naturally
exploited a similar process.
"Eventually, this research
may also help us to understand how genes can escape from GM crops to wild
species or other non-GM crops, and provide solutions to reduce the likelihood
of this happening."
"The next step is to
understand the biological mechanism behind this phenomenon and we will carry
out further studies to answer this."
Record level of rice
imports seen this year
Philippine Daily Inquirer / 05:03 AM February 19,
2019
The Philippines
may see the biggest volume of rice imports this year at 4 million metric tons
(MT) following the passage of the rice import liberalization bill.
Acting
Administrator Tomas Escarez of the National Food Authority (NFA) said on Monday
the agency had already received more than 200 applications from prospective
traders and importers.
The overall
volume from these applications is seen to reach 2 million MT, 20 percent of
which has already arrived in the country.
In addition,
listed AgriNurture Inc. (ANI) president and CEO Antonio Tiu confirmed to the
Inquirer that its deal with Vinafood II, Vietnam’s largest grains exporter,
would still push through this year.
The exporter
agreed to exclusively supply ANI annually with 2 million MT of long grain rice
valued close to $1 billion.
In a text
message, Tiu said the company was only waiting for the law’s implementing rules
and regulations before it would submit an application. It plans to directly
sell the staple to the market.
Under the
recently signed Rice Import Liberalization Act, importers need to secure only a
permit from the Bureau of Plant Industry and pay a 35- and 50-percent tariff
for imports from Southeast Asian countries and non-Asean countries,
respectively.
If the
imports push through, the total volume will surpass the highest recorded rice
imports in the country during the Arroyo administration at 2.34 million MT.
Unlike in
Vietnam and Thailand where farmers can produce a kilo of rice at P6, Filipino
farmers spend P12 a kilo.
Reports from
the Philippine Advisory Farmers Board showed the farm-gate price of palay has
already declined to P14 a kilo in some rice-producing provinces. Meanwhile, in
the country’s rice granaries, the recorded farm-gate price for palay was at
P18-P19 a kilo.
Based on the
Philippine Statistics Authority’s price monitoring report, the average
farm-gate price of palay as of the first week of February was at P19.70 a kilo.
This was the fifth consecutive week of a price downtrend.
However,
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol said on his Facebook page that the falling
price of palay was not due to the recently enacted law but due to “speculation
fueled by the anticipated ’flooding’ of the market with cheap imported rice.”
https://business.inquirer.net/265287/record-level-of-rice-imports-seen-this-year#ixzz5fySrzJ7a
https://business.inquirer.net/265287/record-level-of-rice-imports-seen-this-year#ixzz5fySrzJ7a
Implementation of law easing rice imports to begin March 5
By CNN Philippines Staff
Updated 16:44 PM PHT Tue,
February 19, 2019
21210
The new law easing import restrictions on rice will take effect on
March 3, as approved by the policy-making National Food Authority Council
Monday. (FILE PHOTO)
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 19) — The new law easing import restrictions on rice will
take effect on March 5, the Department of Finance (DOF) clarified Tuesday.
A DOF press release on Monday said that the Implementing Rules
and Regulations (IRR) of the rice tariffication law will be enacted
on March 3. The DOF is part of the National Food Authority (NFA) Council.
However, Finance Undersecretary Tony Lambino noted that since
the date of the law's publication on the Official Gazette was on February
18, the law will take effect on March 5 as approved by the
policy-making body.
Lambino pointed out during the Palace briefing that the
liberalization of rice imports is expected to cut retail prices of the staple
by ₱2 to ₱7 a kilo, which will benefit Filipinos including farmers who are net
consumers of rice.
He said the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) projects that
lower rice prices will cut the inflation rate by 0.6 percentage
points.
NFA's functions, including its Food Development Center, will be
turned over to the Department of Agriculture (DA).
The Council also ordered the NFA to submit a restructuring plan
within 30 days instead of its earlier 180-day proposal.
According to the statement, Finance Secretary Carlos
"Sonny" Dominguez III presided over the meeting as
"endorsed" by Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol. Piñol was absent.
Others in the meeting were Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez,
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy Governor Diwa Guinigundo, Agriculture
Undersecretary Ariel Cayanan, and representatives of the National Economic
Development Authority.
President Rodrigo Duterte signed the bill into law on February
15. He had certified the bill as urgent in October in response to rising
commodity prices.
The law removed from the NFA its power to implement negotiable
warehouse receipts for grains, inspect grains for inventory, register, license
and supervise warehouses and mills, and to regulate the grains trade.
Businesses and individuals can now buy rice from foreign sources
and just pay the 40 percent tariff. Tax proceeds will fund programs to help
farmers such as mass irrigation, rice storage and research initiatives.
Piñol, in a Facebook post Sunday, said he will support the rice
tarriffication law amid claims he is against it.
"My personal views will not matter on whether these twin
moves should be implemented or not," Piñol said. "The Philippine
Government made these commitments to the World Trade Organization negotiations
many, many years ago and these are commitments that we must honor or else we
will face trade disputes from other WTO member countries."
Vice President
worries about 'safety nets'
Vice President Leni Robredo, however, expresed concern over the
so-called "safety nets" for farmers.
"Sana, unang una, ayusin iyong IRR, iyong implementing
rules and regulations, siguruhin na iyong mawawala sa mga farmers, mayroon
tayong pampalit-mayroon tayong pampalit na subsidies saka assistance, para
maihanda iyong ating mga magsasaka. Tapos ayusin iyong implementation. Kasi
kapag hindi natin naayos iyong IRR, kapag hindi natin naayos iyong
implementation ng safety nets, kawawa iyong ating mga magsasaka," Robredo
said in a statement.
[Translation: Hopefully, first, we fix the IRR (implementing
rules and regulations), ensure that whatever the farmers lost, we can return.
There should be subsidies and assistance ready for our farmers. And it must be
properly implemented. If we don't set the IRR up properly and we don't
implement the safety nets properly, our farmers will suffer.]
Economic managers said the law would lower rice prices, which at
a time hit ₱70 per kilogram in some areas last year. Farmer group Kilusan
ng Magbubukid ng Pilipinas wants the law scrapped, calling it a "death
warrant" for the rice industry and deny farmers of their livelihood.
This story was updated to include statements from Finance
Undersecretary Tony Lambino.
Serge
Osmeña suggests reducing tariff on rice imports every year
ABS-CBN News
Former Senator Sergio "Serge" Osmeña III. Jonathan Cellona, ABS-CBN News
MANILA - Marginal farmers are going to suffer from the rice
tariffication bill recently signed into law by President Rodrigo Duterte, said
former Senator Sergio "Serge" Osmeña III.
"Those that are only making about 70-80 cavans a hectare
will suffer because the wholesale price and the retail price will go down to
about P40," Osmeña said on ABS-CBN News Channel's (ANC) Headstart.
But while P40 is still "pretty good," he said the
price of the basic staple needs to go down further.
"So, I suggest every year or every 2 years, we bring down
the tariff of the [imported] rice from 35 to 30 [percent], then from 25 to 20
[percent]; and from 15 then to 10 [percent]," he said.
Osmeña said that in Thailand, the retail value of rice is P22
per kilo, while it is between P40 to P45 a kilo here.
He stressed that the 109-million Filipino rice eaters cannot
spend about 17 percent of their income on just the rice.
"That's for the ordinary, regular Filipino family. But for
the poor, they spend about 20 to 25 to 30 percent of their income on a kilo of
rice. That is too much," he said.
Bringing down the cost by half would mean more money left to buy
viands and other needs, he said.
"We have to think of 109-million Filipino consumers first
before we think of the 2 million rice farmers," he said. "The rice
farmers, I think about one and a half million of them will be OK but the other
half million are going to suffer unless they can come up with lower cost of
production."
Farmers, he said, could grow other crops like cacao or peanuts,
which would give them additional income other than just rice farming.
The rice tariffication law, which local farmers opposed, will
replace the present quotas on rice imports with tariffs.
In defending the measure, Duterte said it would address the
urgent need to improve availability of rice in the country, prevent artificial
rice shortages, reduce the prices of rice in the market, and curtail corruption
and cartel domination in the rice industry.
To assist local farmers who are expected to be hit by the
removal of rice import restrictions, the measure provides for a rice
competitiveness enhancement fund or “rice fund.”
"Right now, the farmer must suffer a little bit because of
this tariffication but we will give him P25-B worth of help every year,"
said Osmeña.
He said this would help farmers mechanize, make them use
certified seeds, aside from subsidizing the cost of fertilizer.
"It all depends on how efficient our bureaucracy is. I hope
it will happen soon," he said, when asked how soon the benefits or the
safety measures of the law would kick in.
Osmeña is running as an independent in the May 13 midterm
elections.
Guv: Rice tariffication is anti-farmer, pro- importer
BACOLOD. National Food Authority employees led by Provincial
Manager Frisco Canoy (right) during their “Black Protest” against the newly-signed
rice tariffication law at the agency's office in Bacolod City on Monday,
February 18. (Contributed photo)
+
AA
-
February 19, 2019
NEGROS Occidental Governor Alfredo Marañon Jr. said on Monday,
February 18, the recently-signed rice tariffication law is anti- farmer and
pro- importer.
Marañon said that in order to compete with imported rice, local farmers should strive for better productivity.
“Production costs for imported rice are not that high because foreign farmers have the support of their respective government. While here, we lack such support from the government,” he pointed out.
Though, the governor said the province has been striving to be rice sufficient.
The Office of the Provincial Agriculturist (OPA) reported that the province was about 93 percent rice sufficient in 2017, he recalled.
On February 15, President Rodrigo Duterte has signed into law the measure lifting restrictions on rice importation.
Under the rice tariffication bill, quantitative restrictions on rice importation are lifted and private traders are allowed to import the commodity from countries of their choice.
OPA has recognized the need to prepare local farmers on the possible adverse effects of the measure.
It is pushing for the reduction of production cost and increasing productivity through various measures like mechanization, more credit support, and timely provision of quality seeds, among others.
Marañon said that in order to compete with imported rice, local farmers should strive for better productivity.
“Production costs for imported rice are not that high because foreign farmers have the support of their respective government. While here, we lack such support from the government,” he pointed out.
Though, the governor said the province has been striving to be rice sufficient.
The Office of the Provincial Agriculturist (OPA) reported that the province was about 93 percent rice sufficient in 2017, he recalled.
On February 15, President Rodrigo Duterte has signed into law the measure lifting restrictions on rice importation.
Under the rice tariffication bill, quantitative restrictions on rice importation are lifted and private traders are allowed to import the commodity from countries of their choice.
OPA has recognized the need to prepare local farmers on the possible adverse effects of the measure.
It is pushing for the reduction of production cost and increasing productivity through various measures like mechanization, more credit support, and timely provision of quality seeds, among others.
In the Philippines,
where ‘rice is life,’ a move to allow more imports signals change
·
· Feb 18, 2019 Updated 8 hrs ago
BULACAN, Philippines — The
Philippines has long touted the idea of self-sufficiency in rice, an essential staple
here at the heart of every breakfast, lunch and dinner.
But rice growers like Efraen
Serrano know that dream is falling further out of reach. The country’s
geography doesn’t provide enough suitable land for the crop as the population
swells. Urbanization and the pull to work in cities have reduced the number of
farmers.
“More farms are being converted
to factories and homes,” said Serrano, who farms a five-acre family plot in
Bulacan, a quickly urbanizing province north of Manila. “Nobody wants to buy
land and use it to farm.”
The 66-year-old says he’s now
resigned to the fact that less and less of the rice Filipinos eat will be grown
by farmers like him.
“Imports are a necessity,” he
said.
In the clearest sign yet that he
is right, the country has ended a two-decades-old cap on private-sector imports
of the grain. The move marks a radical change for a nation whose obsession with
rice is ordinarily matched by its protection of domestic producers.
“Importation is always sensitive
because rice is the No. 1 agricultural sector,” said Ramon Clarete, a professor
of economics at the University of the Philippines Diliman.
But resistance to buying more of
it abroad has lifted over the last several months following a bout of severe
inflation that sparked long lines in the streets for government-subsidized
rice.
It’s hard to overstate the
importance of rice in the Philippines.
The country of 105 million is the
world’s sixth-largest consumer of rice on a per capita basis, according to the
U.S. Department of Agriculture.
“Rice is life in the
Philippines,” said Nicholas Mapa, a senior economist in Manila for ING. “Almost
everything comes from rice. Even our delicacies are based on the grain.”
When politicians want to curry
favor in poor neighborhoods, they come bearing sacks of rice. Gas stations
offer free bags of it with any purchases of about $10. And one of the nation’s
most popular restaurant chains, Mang Inasal, is famed for its “unlimited rice”
— a menu option better known as “unli” (Filipinos have a penchant for
shortening words. McDonald’s, for example, is simply called McDo).
One of the most legendary
varieties of rice, IR8, was developed at the International Rice Research
Institute in the Philippines. Dubbed “magic rice,” the high-yield strain is
credited with fending off famine across Southeast Asia and India starting in
the 1960s.
“Even if you have no ulam,” said
36-year-old Jaquelin Marsan, using the Tagalog word for a dish of meat or
vegetable, “you have to have rice. It’s a priority.”
She lives with her husband and
their eight children — aged 7 months to 19 years — in a ramshackle Manila slum
of scavenged wood and corrugated sheet metal homes called Del Pan Binondo.
Two-fifths of their meager income
is spent on rice. During the surge in rice prices last year, she had to cut
back the family’s consumption by a quarter.
“The children complained,” Marsan
said. “So my husband and I ate less.”
Economists blamed the crisis on
new taxes, costlier fuel and a failure on the government’s part to restock rice
reserves in time.
As criticism mounted about his
administration’s handling of the shortage, President Rodrigo Duterte deflected
blame and trained his scorn on other players such as rice traders.
“I now ask all the rice hoarders,
cartels and their protectors,” the president said with a menacing glare during
his State of the Nation address last year. “Stop messing with the people.”
The crisis harked back to a more
severe shortage in 2008 in which President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo deployed
armed soldiers to watch over rice distribution and ordered fast-food chains to
reduce their rice portions by half.
Prices today have since tapered.
But fearing a repeat, the Philippine Senate passed a bill in November lifting
the import cap and providing funds to cushion the blow on the shrinking
domestic rice farming industry. The bill became law Friday, and the law will
take effect March 3.
Economic reformers and the
country’s central bank have long championed lifting the import quota, which was
supposed to protect farmers but instead led to rampant smuggling and left the
country vulnerable to price manipulation by domestic rice traders.
Under World Trade Organization
rules, the Philippines was obligated to eventually eliminate the cap — which
stands at about 888,000 tons, or about 6 percent of the nation’s annual
consumption. But the country had been winning waivers to keep it by arguing for
more time to reach self-sufficiency.
Resistance to the change came
from vested interests in the agricultural sector and parts of the powerful National
Food Authority, an agency charged with importing and maintaining the country’s
rice reserves for the poor — a mandate that put officials there in an ideal
position to accept kickbacks.
The agency did not respond to an
interview request. A spokesman for the president’s office also did not respond
to a request for comment.
Even with the cap in place, the
Philippines is the world’s second-largest importer of rice after China, giving
it the power to move global grain markets.
Now major rice-producing nations
such as Vietnam and Thailand stand to benefit from the lifting of the quota,
even with the Philippines’ 35 percent tariff on Southeast Asian rice imports.
The move to increase imports
could also bolster Duterte’s PDP-Laban political party heading into midterm
election in May. Rice prices disproportionately affect the poorest Filipinos, a
crucial voting bloc. Nearly half their food expenditures go toward the staple,
according to the Philippine Statistics Authority.
“You can raise the price of
gasoline, water and electricity, but not rice,” said Jorge Tigno, a professor
of political science at the University of the Philippines Diliman. “It’s the
only commodity politicians are not allowed to sacrifice.”
(EDITORS: STORY CAN END HERE)
The crisis last year tested the
political power of the nation’s 3 million farmers. They lost.
“The president’s political
strength will not be based on rice farmers, but more on workers and the urban
poor,” said Clarete, the economics professor.
Back in Bulacan, Serrano said his
crop has dwindled since a shopping center started siphoning water away from his
land a few years ago. And even when rice prices soared last year, he saw none
of the extra profits returned to him.
“There’s so many middlemen who
make the money,” said Serrano, who earns about $3,800 a year.
Unless one of his grandchildren
chooses to takeover his rice fields, Serrano may be the last generation in his
family to farm. His four children have all left Bulacan to work in factories
closer to the city.
“I have no one to take over,” he
said.
Business
as usual for rice industry after Duterte signs rice tariffication law
Anna Gabriela A. Mogato
Published 6:41 PM, February 18, 2019
Updated 6:47 PM, February 18, 2019
CARRY ON. Rice industry
stakeholders will continue to operate as usual as they attempt to secure more
safeguards through the IRR. Photo by Mau Victa/Rappler
MANILA, Philippines – The
country's rice industry will not come to a halt so quickly after President
Rodrigo Duterte signed Republic Act No. 11203 or the rice tariffication lawlast
Thursday, February 14.
In a phone
interview, Confederation of Grains Retailers Association of the
Philippines Incorporated spokesperson Orly Manuntag said they will continue to
operate despite the looming fear that businesses may fold up if there would be
no locally sourced palay or unhusked rice.
"Even if they won't stop
operating, they will be pushed to do so. Surely, a lot will be a
deficit," Manuntag said in a mix of Filipino and English. (READ: Butterfly effect: How rice
tariffication bill affects everyone)
"For now, [things may look
good because] other countries have a good harvest, so they can sell their rice
for cheap."
Rice industry stakeholders were
given the chance to appeal a
week before the bill was set to lapse into law. This was despite the fact that
Duterte had already set his mind on fully
lifting quantitative restrictions on rice imports in 2018, after the National
Food Authority (NFA) had experienced a drop in buffer stocks, leading to higher
prices of rice in the market.
This goes against the
administration's early promise to be fully self-sufficient.
The President also had said
that allowing "anyone who has
money" to import and stripping the NFA of its regulatory
powers can help rid of rice cartels.
(READ: Progressive groups fear new tariff
law will lead to rice cartels)
"Of course we farmers are
saddened when President Duterte signed the law," Philippine Farmers
Advisory Board Chairperson Edwin Paraluman said in a mix of English and
Filipino during a phone interview with Rappler.
"[W]e are saddened because
we farmers are the ones who produce food for the country, but in the
tariffication [law], we won't fully benefit from it. If we do, it's not
enough," he added.
Paraluman also represents the
farmers' sector in the NFA.
Asked if they will continue
farming despite the odds, Paraluman answered: "Of course. We have no
choice. We have to."
PROTEST. Employees of the
National Food Authority stage an early morning Black Monday Protest inside
their headquarters in Quezon City to express their support to farmers in view
of the recent enactment of the rice tarifficaton law which they say will be
unfavorable and a burden to farmers. Photo by Jire Carreon/Rappler
NFA Deputy Administrator Tomas
Escarez in a Facebook post on
Sunday, February 17, said that he already wholeheartedly accepted the decision.
"In the meantime, let us
continue with our work. Even as we are saddened by the unexpected turn of
events, let us not fail in our duty to provide the best service to our
stakeholders and countrymen," he added.
Escarez said the NFA will
continue to buy palay from farmers at P20.70
per kilogram (kg) amid the drop in farmgate prices to around P14 to P15 per kg,
and sell the rice at P27 per kg through accredited NFA retail outlets.
Progressive groups fear new tariff law will lead to rice cartels
"We [will] continue to
monitor and police our grains businessmen to ensure fair trade among themselves
and for all rice consumers," he added.
Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel
Piñol in a separate Facebook post explained
that the drop in the buying price of palay was not because of the
passage of the law. The law will take effect 15 days after its publication in
the Official
Gazette or in a newspaper of general circulation.
"The fall in the buying
price by traders is a result of speculation fueled by the anticipated
'flooding' of the market with cheap, imported rice which is expected with the
opening up of the market," he added.
The Department of Finance said in
a statement on Monday, February 18, that the new tariffied regime will start on
March 3.
The fight continues
As the rice tariffication law may
lead to the loss of jobsfor the
agency's employees, Escarez said that they will "still fight for the best
deal" during the drafting of the implementing rules and regulations (IRR).
However, Manuntag said that
inserting safeguards in the IRR is not enough.
"The economic
managers just told us that if we have any concerns, we should just put it in
the IRR, but that shouldn't be the approach here," he added.
"Because the IRR, it can be
changed. You can remove and you can add, But the law, that will still be the
one that's followed."
Another option they're looking at
is introducing another bill that will repeal or amend the law.
"This is a big challenge. So
for those who will be running — the congressmen, the senators, whether they are
pro- or against the admin, this is a big challenge for them. If they are really
the senator for our country, for our countrymen, they should take a look at our
food security, our food safety," Manuntag said.
Nothing to fear
In an attempt to quell further
disinformation, Piñol in the same Facebook post said that the passage of the
rice tariffication law does not mean the country will be flooded with rice, as
there is limited supply available in the world market.
"As it is now, the volume of
rice traded in the world market every year is only about 40 million metric tons
of which about 38 million [metric tons] is already committed to specific
non-rice producing countries," Piñol said.
RICE PRICES. Consumers line up to
buy rice at the Commonwealth market in Quezon City on February 18, 2019. Photo
by Jire Carreon/Rappler
This is amid increasing world
population. According to Piñol, this means that Thailand and Vietnam – the
country's traditional rice suppliers – may not be able to export rice to the
Philippines a few years from now.
As a protective measure, Piñol
said that the government will continue its Rice Production Program to avoid
totally being dependent on imports which may get more expensive. (READ: Gov't to support farmers amid moves
to lift rice import quotas)
"The proposal by some
economists that the Philippines would do better just importing rice rather than
invest in its local rice production program is a short-sighted
perspective," Piñol added.
"If this view prevails, the
Philippines will face a real rice crisis a few years from now with sky-high
prices which the poor cannot afford." (READ: History of Rice Crisis in the
Philippines)
Another safeguard found in the
rice tariffication law is the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund which will
provide the rice industry P10 billion to improve crop production. This will
come from the tariffs and duties collected from imported rice. Under the ASEAN
Trade in Goods Agreement, rice imports coming from the country's Southeast
Asian neighbors will have an import duty of 35%, while rice imports coming from
non-ASEAN countries will be set higher.
"Properly used, the RCEF
could actually increase the productivity of Filipino rice farmers because farm
mechanization alone will increase production efficiency and reduce post-harvest
losses estimated at 16% of total production," Piñol said. – Rappler.com
Palace assures corruption-free rice fund
February
19, 2019
THE P10-billion Rice Competitveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF) that
will be funded from the tariffs on rice imports will be free from corruption,
Malacañang assured the public on Tuesday, February 19.
The Palace made the statement to allay fears of some groups of farmers, who were worried that the fund would be used for corruption just like the P728 million in fertilizer funds that were allegedly diverted to the 2004 campaign of former President, now House Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
In a statement, Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo reiterated that President Rodrigo Duterte and his administration have "zero tolerance" for any irregularities in government.
"Good governance is the hallmark of the Duterte Administration and the President has zero tolerance against corruption and wastage of taxpayers’ money," Panelo said.
"We continue to exercise accountability and transparency in all levels of the bureaucracy," he added.
Under Republic Act (RA) 11203, the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund, or simply the Rice Fund, will have an annual appropriation of P10 billion for the next six years, in a bid to help farmers improve their profitability and competitiveness.
The funds will come from the tariffs that will be imposed on rice imports, as follows: 35 percent for rice coming from members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) and 50% for rice coming from non-Asean countries.
RA 11203 imposes tariffs on rice imports to replace the quantitative restrictions that were removed. Under this new law, traders may import rice without having to secure permits from the National Food Authority.
At the end of the sixth year of implementation, a mandatory review shall be conducted by the Congressional Oversight Committee on Agricultural and Fisheries Modernization (COCAFM) to determine whether the Rice Fund shall be continued, amended, or terminated.
The Secretary of Agriculture, as mandated by RA 11203, shall be accountable and responsible for the Rice Fund.
Panelo said the Department of Agriculture (DA) would conduct a consultation with farmers' cooperatives and organizations, and local government units, for the effective implementation of the law.
"The Department of Agriculture, in consultation with farmers’ cooperatives and organizations as well as local government units, shall also validate and update the master list of eligible beneficiaries, which include farmers, farmworkers, rice cooperatives and associations," he said.
The law likewise provides that a Rice Industry Roadmap will be formulated and adopted to restructure the government's delivery of support services for the rice sector.
Panelo called on rice farmer groups to become "pro-active" in the cradtng of the Rice Industry Roadmap to ensure that safeguards aimed at eliminating corruption "are in place."
"We ask rice farmer representatives and vital stakeholders to be pro-active in the discussion and review of the crafting of the Rice Industry Roadmap and Internal Rules and Regulations with other concerned agencies of the government to ensure the effective and efficient implementation of the new measure," he said. (SunStar Philippines)
The Palace made the statement to allay fears of some groups of farmers, who were worried that the fund would be used for corruption just like the P728 million in fertilizer funds that were allegedly diverted to the 2004 campaign of former President, now House Speaker Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
In a statement, Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo reiterated that President Rodrigo Duterte and his administration have "zero tolerance" for any irregularities in government.
"Good governance is the hallmark of the Duterte Administration and the President has zero tolerance against corruption and wastage of taxpayers’ money," Panelo said.
"We continue to exercise accountability and transparency in all levels of the bureaucracy," he added.
Under Republic Act (RA) 11203, the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund, or simply the Rice Fund, will have an annual appropriation of P10 billion for the next six years, in a bid to help farmers improve their profitability and competitiveness.
The funds will come from the tariffs that will be imposed on rice imports, as follows: 35 percent for rice coming from members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) and 50% for rice coming from non-Asean countries.
RA 11203 imposes tariffs on rice imports to replace the quantitative restrictions that were removed. Under this new law, traders may import rice without having to secure permits from the National Food Authority.
At the end of the sixth year of implementation, a mandatory review shall be conducted by the Congressional Oversight Committee on Agricultural and Fisheries Modernization (COCAFM) to determine whether the Rice Fund shall be continued, amended, or terminated.
The Secretary of Agriculture, as mandated by RA 11203, shall be accountable and responsible for the Rice Fund.
Panelo said the Department of Agriculture (DA) would conduct a consultation with farmers' cooperatives and organizations, and local government units, for the effective implementation of the law.
"The Department of Agriculture, in consultation with farmers’ cooperatives and organizations as well as local government units, shall also validate and update the master list of eligible beneficiaries, which include farmers, farmworkers, rice cooperatives and associations," he said.
The law likewise provides that a Rice Industry Roadmap will be formulated and adopted to restructure the government's delivery of support services for the rice sector.
Panelo called on rice farmer groups to become "pro-active" in the cradtng of the Rice Industry Roadmap to ensure that safeguards aimed at eliminating corruption "are in place."
"We ask rice farmer representatives and vital stakeholders to be pro-active in the discussion and review of the crafting of the Rice Industry Roadmap and Internal Rules and Regulations with other concerned agencies of the government to ensure the effective and efficient implementation of the new measure," he said. (SunStar Philippines)
Death trap
posted February
19, 2019 at 12:00 am
Budget
Secretary Benjamin Diokno, who once famously told consumers suffering from high
prices to be “less of a crybaby,” has now weighed in on agricultural policy,
suggesting that farmers stop planting rice and shift to more high-value crops.
Observing
that agriculture contributed less than 1 percent to the growth in gross
domestic product in 2018, the Budget chief said the economic picture would
improve if farmers shifted to high-value crops and the country relied on
cheaper rice imports.
“A
growth of maybe 3-4 percent is possible for the sector if we focus on
high-value crops and just import rice,” Diokno said last week. “That is the
most efficient economic arrangement. And as I said, you always have to think of
what’s the greatest good for the farmers.”
In
his rush to burnish his economic numbers, however, the secretary fails to
mention how critical rice is in the Filipino diet, and how foolish it would be
to rely on the kindness of strangers for the long-term supply of this staple.
It
may indeed be cheaper today to import rice but the largest exporters of rice in
the region today—India, Thailand, Vietnam and China—are also among the biggest
consumers of the grain. It would be reasonable to assume that in a lean crop
year, they would cut back on exports to feed their own people or raise the
price of their commodity, two possibilities that would spell trouble for a
rice-consuming nation that didn't have its own production and merely depended
on imports.
Agriculture
Secretary Emmanuel Piñol sums up this argument well.
“It
is as certain as the sun will rise tomorrow that 10 years from now, Vietnam,
Thailand, Cambodia, Myanmar, Pakistan and India will no longer be able to
export the same volume of rice that they ship out today. They have to feed
their growing population as well,” he said. “The policy to just rely on
imported rice and ask our rice farmers to diversify to other crops is a death
trap. It is a shortsighted view which will kill the rice industry and drive
away farmers from the rice fields.”
President
Rodrigo Duterte's 10-point economic agenda calls for, among other things,
increasing agricultural and rural enterprise productivity.
Instead
of writing off rice farmers as being uncompetitive or asking them to shift to
more lucrative crops, the government should be finding ways to make them more
competitive, by making sure they have adequate financing, protection from
natural disasters, access to a distribution system that does not take unfair
advantage of them, and new technology that can boost productivity and protect
their crops.
Data
from the Southeast Asian Regional Center and the International Rice Research
Institute show that in 2010, among five large Asian rice-producing nations, the
Philippines devoted only 4.53 million hectares (ha) to rice production, a far
cry from 44 million ha in India, 29.49 million ha in China, 12.31 million ha in
Indonesia, 10.25 million ha in Thailand and 7.41 million ha in Vietnam. Yet the
Philippines fed the most number of persons per hectare or rice area harvested.
President
Duterte has already pinpointed the problem: arable lands have been taken by the
rich to grow cash crops—much as his Budget secretary is urging the remaining
rice farmers to do.
The
President knows, too, that food security requires us to aim for
self-sufficiency, regardless of the short-term gains that importing rice might
bring.
Rice export prices fall in top Asian
hubs
Rice export prices fell in top Asian hubs this week on slow
demand and rising supply following a quiet start to the year, while limited
interest from the Philippines failed to spur a Vietnamese market reeling from
Chinese import restrictions. In top exporter India, 5 percent broken parboiled
variety eased to $380-$385 per tonne from $383-$388 last week as supply from
the winter crop poured in. Demand from Asian and African buyers was subdued, an
exporter based in Kakinada in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh said.
India's rice exports between April and December dropped 10.2 percent from a year earlier to 8.46 million tonnes, a government body said last week. In Thailand, benchmark 5 percent broken rice prices fell to $382-$398 a tonne, free on board Bangkok, from $390-$402 previously. "The market has been really quiet and new supply of rice is coming out now," a Bangkok-based trader said.
A weaker domestic currency was adding further pressure to prices, traders said. "More supply will lower prices further but exporters are still looking for buyers because it has really been quiet since the start of the year," another trader said. Thailand is the world's second biggest rice exporter followed by Vietnam, where rates for benchmark 5 percent broken rice fell to $340 a tonne from $350 two weeks ago before the markets closed for the Lunar New Year holiday.
"Trade has resumed and we have seen more buyers from the Philippines placing orders," a trader based in Ho Chi Minh City said, adding that private buyers from rice-scarce Philippines purchased about 20,000 tonnes this week. However, China has been imposing stricter conditions for rice imports from Vietnam, traders said. China will likely cut rice shipments from Vietnam to 500,000-600,000 tonnes this year from around 1.5-2 million tonnes a year in the past, another trader said.
"We think the government will likely buy rice this year for stockpiling, giving a support for domestic prices." Export prices, however, will be under pressure as the major winter-spring harvest peaks by month-end, traders said. Elsewhere, Bangladesh, which saw imports surge in 2017 after floods wreaked havoc on local crops, will procure more rice locally as output has revived a food ministry official from the country said.
"We are getting good response in our local procurement drive and will continue it," the official said. Bangladesh has procured nearly 1.4 million tonnes of rice locally so far in the current season to build state reserves.
India's rice exports between April and December dropped 10.2 percent from a year earlier to 8.46 million tonnes, a government body said last week. In Thailand, benchmark 5 percent broken rice prices fell to $382-$398 a tonne, free on board Bangkok, from $390-$402 previously. "The market has been really quiet and new supply of rice is coming out now," a Bangkok-based trader said.
A weaker domestic currency was adding further pressure to prices, traders said. "More supply will lower prices further but exporters are still looking for buyers because it has really been quiet since the start of the year," another trader said. Thailand is the world's second biggest rice exporter followed by Vietnam, where rates for benchmark 5 percent broken rice fell to $340 a tonne from $350 two weeks ago before the markets closed for the Lunar New Year holiday.
"Trade has resumed and we have seen more buyers from the Philippines placing orders," a trader based in Ho Chi Minh City said, adding that private buyers from rice-scarce Philippines purchased about 20,000 tonnes this week. However, China has been imposing stricter conditions for rice imports from Vietnam, traders said. China will likely cut rice shipments from Vietnam to 500,000-600,000 tonnes this year from around 1.5-2 million tonnes a year in the past, another trader said.
"We think the government will likely buy rice this year for stockpiling, giving a support for domestic prices." Export prices, however, will be under pressure as the major winter-spring harvest peaks by month-end, traders said. Elsewhere, Bangladesh, which saw imports surge in 2017 after floods wreaked havoc on local crops, will procure more rice locally as output has revived a food ministry official from the country said.
"We are getting good response in our local procurement drive and will continue it," the official said. Bangladesh has procured nearly 1.4 million tonnes of rice locally so far in the current season to build state reserves.
Rice
Tuesday, February 19, 2019
OVER THE PAST quarter century,
the population has risen from 65 million to 105 million. Land areas, caused
increases in sea levels notwithstanding, has remained fairly constant at
300,000 square kilometers. Population density therefore, has risen from 217 per
square kilometer to 350.
Where do the additional 40
million go?
A fair proportion now lives on land which in the 1990s was pristine rice land.
A fair proportion now lives on land which in the 1990s was pristine rice land.
A burgeoning population coupled
with reduced rice land makes rice self-sufficiency an ever-increasing
challenge.
In 2010, Agriculture Secretary
Alcala was appointed by incoming President Aquino. Alcala said that rice
self-sufficiency was attainable by 2013. This target was not met. Food security
means we have to depend on imports. We no longer talk about rice
self-sufficiency.
***
Last week, President Duterte
signed the Rice Tarrification Law. This introduces a tariff of 35 percent on
rice imports from ASEAN member-states and 50 percent from non-ASEAN countries.
Importers will also have to
secure a phytosanitary permit from the Bureau of Plant Industry. I hope this
requirement will be implemented fairly.
A 35 percent tariff does, of
course, attract smuggling which has bedeviled the sugar industry in the past.
We need vigilance from incorruptible government officials.
Support for rice farmers is a
concern. A smoothly operating Rice Competitive Enhancement Fund (Rice Fund) is
a must.
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP)
regularly issues instructions to banks to implement more lending to farmers.
Like most BSP instructions, these
are not fully implemented by the banks. It is high time for the banks to reach
out more to farmers, many of whom are nervously reluctant to establish a
dialogue with banks. The Hanjin debacle should show the banking sector that it
needs to look to create more lending opportunities with others, including
farmers.
***
I believe the Rice Tarrification
Bill well reflects the current situation. We should not have a repeat of last
August when problems of rice importation cause unacceptable price increases
and, in all probability, a consequential increase in poverty.
The Philippines Statistics
Authority conducts, every three years, a Family Income and Expenditure Survey
(FIES). In past year this has shown a slow but steady decline in poverty from
26.6 percent in 2006, 26.3 percent in 2009, 25.2 percent in 2012, and 21.6
percent in 2015. Data for 2018 is due to be published next month.
We are, nevertheless, failing to
meet the UN Development Goals which, for the Philippines specified a reduction
of poverty from 33 percent in 2000 to 16.5 percent in 2015. The UN’s
Sustainable Development Goal for 2030 is to reduce poverty incidence to 8.25
percent.
We have a long way to go./PN
Philippines looks to
drones to boost farming
Drones can
improve on how seeds are planted, how fertilisers and pesticides are applied,
and how crops are monitored.
Technology is fast advancing and
has produced machinery that could change what was once a laborious and tedious
farming process into an efficient and automated one.
The Philippines has seen the
entry of farm machinery that has changed various manual operations to automated
ones such as carabaos becoming tractors.
As reported, the Department of Agriculture (DA) is evaluating the
potential of drones in changing how seeds are planted, how fertilisers and
pesticides are applied, and how crops are monitored.
Department of Agriculture
Secretary Emmanuel F. Piñol shared that drones are the future of agriculture
and that digitisation is the way forward.
The Department initially tried to
use drones in 2015 when they collaborated with the Food and Agriculture Organisation
(FAO) of the United Nations, for the use of the aerial mapping capacity of
drones in pre-disaster and post-disaster assessments.
Types of Drones
At present, the Department’s
central office has a twin-engine fixed wing, a single-engine fixed wing and a
quadcopter UAV unit.
A single-engine fixed wing could
cover 200 hectares within 60 minutes, while a twin-engine fixed wing could
cover 800 to 1,000 hectares in 90 minutes. A quadcopter could cover 50 hectares
in 30 minutes.
Two of the Department’s regional
offices have a twin-engine fixed wing, while 10 regional offices have
single-engine fixed wing. All regional offices, meanwhile, have a quadcopter.
Moreover, part of expanding the
drone fleet would be the construction of a technology centre or a hub that
would house their UAVs and other related technologies.
Benefits of Drones
In April 2018, the Secretary
indicated that the Department will explore the possibilities and opportunities
that drone technology could provide to Filipino farmers.
They see drones as a technology
that would further mechanise the farm sector and cut the cost of production.
Various agencies such as
the Philippine
Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) and the International Rice
Research Institute (IRRI) are now incorporating the use of drones in their
research.
PhilRice, which is an attached
agency of the Department, has found ways to apply drones in crop management,
application farm inputs, seed planting, and even in fish feeding.
All these are aimed at developing
“precision farming” or “precision agriculture” in the country.
Drones, through available
software, allow farmers to monitor different aspects of rice farming like the
growth rate, nutrient content and pest incidence.
Furthermore, drones could provide
farmers with real-time information on the status of their crops like the height
of the plants and the number of tillers.
This information could help them
make immediate necessary adjustments to improve their produce.
Some drones, such as drone
sprayers, are also equipped with artificial intelligence (AI).
If these drones stop in the
middle of their flight path because they ran out of payload pesticide, they
will return to the spot where they stopped after going back to their pilot for
a refill.
One of the biggest benefits of
drone technology to the farming sector would be the reduction in health and
environmental risks of some practices, such as pesticide spraying.
Another benefit is the ability to
provide a more even distribution of seeds across farm lands. It also uses way
lesser labour time.
Aside from farmers, drone
technology advocates also want the ubiquity of UAV use to attract the younger
generation back to agriculture.
Technology is the magnet that
pulls them back.
Drone Policy
In the Philippines, there is no
clear-cut policy yet on the use of agricultural drones.
The only existing policies refer
to flight height limitations and some restrictions in flying drones in relation
to security, such as prohibition of flight near airports.
It is vital that farmers adopt
modern technologies, including drones, to mitigate the ill effects of climate
change to the agriculture sector.
This is the future. Carbon
footprints should be reduced and that can be done by having a precise
application of fertiliser and other farm inputs.
Digitalisation, drones, satellite
monitoring and GPS-guided precision farming are just some of the new words in
the agricultural vocabulary today.
OpenGov Asia earlier reported on
how the Philippine Rice Research Institute pushes for drone tech in
farming.
The report covers the Memorandum
of Agreement signed by the Agency with a Davao-based drone firm in order to advance
research in the rice sector.
"No genetic engineering means people die"
18 Feb, 2019 13:37
Prof.
David Zilberman insists that agricultural policy must see the whole picture -
he even talks to farmers.
"One day, when my son
brought his new date to our home, I heard him tell her, 'I made a salad for
you. It's organic!,'" relates Prof. David Zilberman, holder of the
Robinson Chair in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the
University of California, Berkeley. "He knows that organic fruits and
vegetables don't mean much as long as they are washed, and sometimes they
are less healthy than regular fruits and vegetables. But I understood that what
he meant was, 'See how cultured I am, how clean I am, how healthy I am, how
rich I am.'"
Zilberman is not enthusiastic
about the organic food trend, as you have presumably realized. "If someone
in the West wants to pay six times more for each leaf, there's nothing wrong
with that," he says. "Organic food is like riding on horseback. It's
not more efficient, it doesn't really pollute less, but it's fun. The problem
starts when people try to force this attitude on the rest of the world.
"Europeans go to Africa or
poor countries in Asia and say, 'Don't use pesticides' or 'Don't use genetic
engineering on fruits and vegetables,' 'Don't make the same mistakes we made.'
But isn't it because of those 'mistakes' that our life expectancy has become so
much longer that the pension funds are collapsing? Without pesticides and
genetic engineering, the environmental damage would be enormous. Who will
suffer as a result? Not the people living in the city and eating organic food;
it will be the people who will have no fruits and vegetables at all. What about
people who have no money? In Africa, Albania, the Hatikvah neighborhood in Tel
Aviv, in the Gaza Strip? You call what they eat 'junk food;' for them, it's
food."
"People go blind because of
a fine agenda"
Zilberman is not an unquestioning
advocate of pesticides and genetic engineering, but he wants us to stick to the
facts and balance different needs. "The challenge is to understand the
whole system. Regulation can do this, sometimes more successfully than people
think," he says.
He cites the example of golden
rice in Bangladesh. "500,000 people around the world go blind every year
because of a lack of Vitamin A. Golden rice, which has been genetically
engineered to contain a larger concentration of this vitamin, can prevent this,
because rice is a basic nutritional item in the nations with people at
risk," Zilberman argues. "The opponents of genetic engineering also
opposed golden rice, because they thought that it was a slippery slope that
would lead to more genetically engineered crops, a takeover of rice crops by
giant companies, and a reduction in the diversity of rice strains in the world.
Meanwhile, however, people are going blind because of this opposition. As a
result of an article of mine, which analyzed the risks and benefits of
approving golden rice, 100 Nobel Prize winners signed a letter supporting this
crop. That happened in 2017, and in 2018, several countries finally approved
golden rice."
Golden rice was developed by the
Philippine Rice Research Institute and distributed free, at the same time as it
was marketed by the big companies. Monsanto announced that it would give it for
free for repeat use as seeds to any farmer earning less than $10,000 a year
from it.
"People say, 'Genetic
engineering belongs to the giant companies,' but genetic engineering belongs to
humanity, not to them. There is genetic engineering at the universities, or as
general knowledge. A Bangladesh research institute, in cooperation with a US
university and the UN, recently developed a new pest-resistant eggplant for
Bangladesh. This product doesn't belong to big companies at all.
"The anti-genetic
engineering agenda sounds fine, but if you apply a logical economic agriculture
model to it, the result is always that people die. Many more people die than
when the alternatives are applied. How can you grow food organically in a humid
place with mosquitos the size of a Boeing airplane? I don't know what kind of
person thinks that he can decide that tens of millions of people in Africa have
no right to exist. A rich person with a full belly can say, 'I prefer not to
take a chance.' Someone who is starving has to take risks.
"Africans aren't stupid, but
when Europeans tell them not to use genetically engineered food or pesticides
because we're sorry we used them, it does worry them. What was the big miracle
in Israel? That every time our so-called patrons told us, 'Don't do this,' or
'Don't do that,' we did it anyway. The Chinese too didn't listen to the
Europeans. The Africans won't necessarily listen, either."
"They turned science into
politics"
When Zilberman began researching
pesticides, he adopted a multidisciplinary approach. "Economists said that
pesticides could be used any way people want in order to increase output, until
you reach a critical level at which the material is no longer healthy.
Sustainability people, on the other hand, wanted to eliminate pesticides
completely. I learned a new model from insect researchers, based on insect
biology. We saw that certain insecticide regimes encouraged resistance of the
insect to them less. On the other hand, if you kill off one pest completely,
another pest is liable to come along. If you don't put biology into the model,
you lack understanding, and when you build the economic models without
understanding, poor people almost always wind up with the short end of the
stick."
The same applies to climate
change. "Although average global warming on Earth won't be so great, in
certain regions, especially those that are already hot and dry, warming will be
very significant, and food can't be grown there as a result. In regions that
are cold now, on the other hand, it will be possible to grow much more food as
a result of the change.
"We therefore believe that
the big problem caused by the change will not be a general worldwide shortage
of food; it will be migration. The food that can't be grown in excessively hot
regions can be grown elsewhere; that's not so terrible. But will people living
in places where agriculture becomes difficult be able to move as they wish to a
place with a more comfortable climate? Will the US open its gates to the
Mexicans? Will the Europeans embrace the Africans? Will the Russians welcome
the Chinese?" Zilberman says, "The solution lies in the development
of technology that will enable farmers in the hot and dry countries to continue
growing enough food, despite the change."
According to Zilberman, genetic
engineering of rice, for example, can make it possible to grow enough rice to
serve as environmentally friendly biological fuel without food prices rising.
Use of genetic engineering can help cope with global warming without burdening
farmers or hungry people.
"Today, there's a split. If
you're a Republican, you're in favor of genetic engineering and skeptical about
climate change. If you're a Democrat, you believe in climate change and should
oppose genetic engineering. They've turned science into politics, and that's
the worst thing. It eventually kills people, but not the politicians'
children."
"Berkeley saved my life"
Zilberman, whose papers and op-ed
articles won over Nobel Prize winners, is a former Israeli who now teaches at
the University of California at Berkeley in the agriculture and resource
economics department. Over the years, his unique perspective and multidisciplinary
knowledge of dilemmas in economics, agriculture, and sustainability have earned
him great credibility among policy-makers. He managed to balance economic needs
against agricultural and environmental needs, and his research is very influential.
A month ago, he was awarded the Wolf Prize in Israel, one of the strongest
predictors of a Nobel Prize.
"I was born in Jerusalem and
studied at Hebrew University High School," he says. "As a result of
serving in the Nahal (Fighting Pioneer Youth) Brigade, I went to Kibbutz Kfar
HaHoresh, where I engaged in farming, of course, because the kibbutz is
essentially a very diverse and modern agricultural unit. I worked in the
chicken sheds and irrigation and harvested apples. This experience taught me
that I didn't want to be a farmer. I realized that I was a city boy."
"Globes": What did you
prefer in the city?
Zilberman: "I like the anonymity, meeting new people. The kibbutz is a
very nice place to live when you're married with a few kids."
Zilberman served as a combat
soldier in the Golan Heights in the Six-Day War, and wanted to study after
being demobilized. "My family wasn't so rich, so I started working as a
sales agent, and then at Koor Computers. That was actually my breakthrough,
because they made me responsible for salaries. From a shy child, I became a
manager responsible for thousands of salaries, but I saw that this wasn't life.
As a kid, you earn money and go to all sorts of restaurants and impress girls,
but it's a lot of work and isn't very interesting. I had two cousins who did
PhDs in the US, and it seemed more attractive to me."
While he was working, Zilberman
studies economics and statistics at Tel Aviv University. "I was always
late, I always slept during lessons, and I nevertheless left a good
impression," he says. He was accepted to a doctoral program at several
leading universities. "I had to choose. It was cold at Cornell, and there
were gangsters in Chicago. The weather in Berkeley was good, and Prof. Eithan
Hochman, my advisor in Israel, was there.
"I just missed the Yom
Kippur War. My entire unit went to the Suez Canal. I offered to join, but I
wasn't an outstanding soldier, and I didn't feel that they would miss me.
Berkeley saved my life."
"There are economists who
don’t know the difference between a chicken and a cow"
Zilberman says that he took up
agricultural economics because Berkeley was a leader in it. "My first
project, which I worked on in order to get my doctoral scholarship, dealt in
animal waste, in other words, cow shit. I researched what was more effective in
preventing pollution: taxing every additional cow or an inflexible limit on the
number of cows per land unit.
"We discovered that the tax
was more effective in preventing pollution than reducing the number of cows,
but the inflexible limit had less of a negative impact on output. We suddenly
understood why policy-makers sometimes choose an inflexible limit instead of a
tax: they are balancing different interests."
Following this research, he
published his first paper, "which appeared in an excellent periodical, and
was a pretty good achievement for a kid newly arrived from Israel who barely
spoke English," he says.
In 1979, after several more such
successes, he got a job at Berkley in agricultural policy. "I didn't know
anything about this field at the time, but the truth is that no one knew very
much about it. The problem with economists is that they don't smoke, don't
drink, and don't do drugs, so they don't die; they just become obsolete. That's
why economics is often out of touch with new trends."
Zilberman decided that he would
not be like the healthy and out-of-date economists. "I traveled all around
California talking to farmers, and that was the best thing I ever did. There
are agricultural economists who don't know the difference between a chicken and
a cow. Some of the people in this field in the US come from agricultural towns
in the Midwest, but they're sometimes the teacher's son or the preacher's son.
A second category is the saints - the ones who want to save the developing
countries and those who want to save the Earth, and the two don't always
exactly correspond. A third group consists of commodity investors."
Zilberman says that they all could benefit from more regular and systematic
exposure to people working in agriculture.
"When there's no drought,
you don't learn anything"
In the late 1970s and early
1980s, Zilberman asked farmers about adoption of technologies. "The
sociologists dominated the field of innovation adoption at the time, and their
theory was that adoption takes place by imitation. They built statistical
models for the rate of spread by imitation. I thought that people weren't
monkeys. They can learn by imitation, but only after they choose to do so.
"I built a model that took
into account a clutch of decisions by individuals, that change with time. For
example, it is possible that their attitude towards technology will change if
the price falls, or if the product is already well-known and the risk drops.
Furthermore, there are different levels of adoption. Small farmers are more
sensitive to risk, so they adopt technologies slowly, but when they do adopt
them, their use of technology is sometimes more extensive and intensive,
because it's more important for them to make back the investment.
"At that time, small farmers
complained that they didn't have enough finance for investment.
Economists didn't accept this, because perfect market theory prevailed at the
time, according to which every venture with a positive return will necessarily
find the capital for investment. We detected market failure in this case, and
one of the most important things that the government did was to provide
financing that enabled small farmers to expand."
Zilberman then became a
well-known name in agricultural economics, and was enlisted in a promising
Israeli project - drip irrigation systems. According to Israeli agricultural
folk tales, it sometimes seems that a hungry and dry world was just waiting for
Israeli drip irrigation systems, but the truth was a little different.
"For purposes of the
project, I decided to study irrigation," Zilberman says. He decided to
delve deeply into plant biology. "You have to understand the basis; that's
my main theme in the profession," he says. "I saw that the contribution
of drip irrigation depended on many factors. On sandy or sloping land, drip
irrigation is effective. In places where the land holds the water well - less
so. If the fruit being grown is expensive and the price of water is high,
there's an incentive to use drip irrigation. There was no water market in
California at the time; there were water rights, so what interest did a farmer
have in using drip irrigation, even if it saves water, unless it was a drought
period in which the water rights were insufficient? In a market like that, if
you want to motivate people to save water, you have to put a price on it. With
some land in which excessive irrigation floods the land, on the other hand,
there's no need for incentives - it's already worthwhile for a farmer to adopt
drip irrigation.
"The inventors of the
Israeli product told me, 'Why didn't you write that everyone needs drip
agriculture? What kind of Israeli patriot are you?' But the product was
gradually accepted in places in which it was really useful, thanks to work by
Netafim, the agricultural lobby, and the government.
"The most important think I
learned in the US was that what makes the US great is not the private sector;
it's only the combination of the private and the government sectors. Who
invented the Internet? The business sector? No, the universities did, with the
help of a lot of public funding. Did Monsanto invent genetic engineering? No
way. Without universities, Monsanto would have had no seeds. Without the
publicly funded universities, there will be no business sector."
Another lesson that Zilberman
learned in the US was that necessity is the mother of adoption of invention.
"When there's no drought, you don't learn anything," he says.
"In 1992, when the fish in California began dying from drought, we succeeded
in opening the water market. The farmers could sell the water to the fish
ponds, and they save water by using drip irrigation."
Zilberman now does a great deal
of work with international organizations, scientists from Africa, and
commercial companies. He says that the Mars chocolate company employed him to
help improve cocoa crop yields. "I go to the fields to talk with the
farmers, who sit in the jungle with a computer in the middle of a cocoa field.
Every kid in Africa now has a bicycle and a mobile phone. The children don't
want to stay in the village. If you want agriculture to continue in Africa, it
has to be modern agriculture, and that's something that I'm working on."
Published by Globes, Israel
business news - en.globes.co.il - on February 18, 2019
Fish in the Fields
Pilot program found to reduce methane emissions in rice fields
·
Feb 18, 2019
Chance Cutrano, a member of the
Resource Renewal Institute, pours a bucket of minnows into a flooded rice field
in Marysville as part of a project to see if the addition of fish can reduce
methane emissions.
·
Morgan Bowen, a research assistant from the
University of Montana, throws a zooplankton net to sample how many organisms
are in the flooded rice field in Marysville earlier this month.
Minnows that will be poured into
a flooded rice field as part of the Fish in the Field pilot project are shown.
A portion of the minnows introduced to the fields must first be weighed and
measured before an identifying clip is placed on them to allow for scientists
to record their growth rates once removed.
While the science is complex, the
idea is simple: put small fish in flooded rice fields and watch them help
combat climate change.
At the end of 2017, several local rice farmers teamed up with
researchers for a pilot program known as “Fish in the Fields” through the
Resource Renewal Institute, a nonprofit research and natural resource policy
group, to see what would happen when fish were introduced to flooded rice
fields.
Now in its second year of experiments, researchers have
concluded that it works, with methane – a climate-changing byproduct of rice
agriculture much more detrimental than carbon dioxide – being reduced by about
two-thirds, or 65 percent, in flooded fields that had fish in them.
“We are really excited about the results,” said Deborah
Moskowitz, president of the Resource Renewal Institute. “In the simplest terms,
what people talk about is carbon dioxide and how that is a greenhouse gas with
certain warming potential. Methane is 25-times worse than carbon dioxide as a
greenhouse gas, so anything we can do to control methane from going off into
the atmosphere is really important. A lot of that methane comes from
agriculture.”
The biggest contributor in agriculture is due to cattle, she
said. After that it’s rice.
The rice decomposition process creates a high amount of methane.
There are methane-oxidizing bacteria present in the decomposing field, which
can offset greenhouse gas emissions, but zooplankton that are also present feed
on the bacteria. The idea is to introduce fish into the mix that will feed on
the zooplankton, leaving more methane-oxidizing bacteria to help reduce
emissions.
“We feel that if we can prove this model in California – with
its half-million acres of rice fields – then it can be applied to many other
rice growing countries around the world,” Moskowitz said. “Rice is one of the
biggest crops in the world. It’s not going away, so we want to figure out how
to deal with some of the negative effects of growing rice.”
Not only did the fish reduce methane gas emissions during the
study, they also flourished under the conditions – growing up to 10 times
larger than fish in natural systems, Moskowitz said. Researches see the benefit
in that because it could potentially be a new source of sustainable protein.
For rice farmers, the process is beneficial for two reasons: it
encourages the state to dedicate more water for farmers because of the benefit
to fish populations, and it could potentially add a new cash crop during the
agricultural offseason.
Local rice farmer and Yuba Water Agency Director Charlie Mathews
has been involved in the Fish in the Fields program from the beginning. He said
the benefits beyond methane reduction are substantial, especially if salmon can
be introduced to the process.
“It helps make the fish grow healthier, which will help them in
their journey through the Delta and out to the ocean. Right now, these fish are
getting to the Delta but they are so small that they are getting eaten up along
the way, so they aren’t getting through,” Mathews said. “The government wants
to take more of our water to put out to the ocean to help the fish get there,
but if the fish are healthier before that, they can go out with less carriage
water. So, that would make the water available for things like farming and for
cities in the south.”
Next steps
The study began with researches studying a number of flooded
rice fields just outside of Marysville to see what microorganisms were present.
After about a month of sampling, the team – led by University of Montana
aquatic ecologist Shawn Devlin and assisted by the UC Davis Department of
Watershed Sciences and CalTrout – introduced minnows to the water.
Near the end of winter 2018, final tests were conducted, water
was released from the fields and the fish were collected to see how big they
grew.
The second phase of studies kicked off on Feb. 6, with the team
adding 12,000 golden shiner minnows into nine experimental ponds designed to
hold varying densities of fish. This phase of the project will help establish
optimal ratios for even greater methane reduction and fish productivity,
Moskowitz said.
The third and final phase, which will begin next winter
following the rice harvest, will be similar to the most recent one and will be
intended to further refine ratios, she said.
“Each year builds on the last, in terms of our knowledge about
how this can work. What we are trying to do is come up with a model that is
both replicable around other regions and scalable to be able to grow,”
Moskowitz said. “So, we will be fine tuning that model of what the proper
ratios are of zooplankton to fish.”
Rota stores running out of rice
19 Feb 2019
By Cherrie Anne E. Villahermosa -
cherrie@mvariety.com - Variety News Staff
STORES on Rota are again running
out of rice and other commodities due to long-standing shipping problems,
according to an employee of one of the stores who declined to be identified.
The employee said their rice supply will last for a few days only, adding
that the last time a shipment arrived was in December.
In a separate phone interview,
Pete Dela Cruz, president of Rota Merchandising, said the port of Rota cannot
unload shipments because its mobile crane has been broken for three months now.
His company handles the arrivals,
departures, bookings and bill of lading for shipping companies on Rota.
Currently, Dela Cruz said some
commodities are brought to Rota by plane which results in “very high prices.”
He added, “There is a small boat,
about 24 to 25 feet, that brings commodities from Guam, but it is also having
some mechanical problems — not to mention the rough waters over the past
several weeks now.”
According to the store employee,
they have to pay Star Marianas 55 cents per pound of any product flown to Rota.
A 10-pound bag of rice for example will cost $5.50. This will be added to its
store-price which is $14.99. On Saipan, a 10-pound bag of rice is sold
for $6.99
Soda and beers are the other
commodities flown from Guam to Rota. Right now, a can of soda on Rota costs
$1.35 and a case of beer is $39.99. The prices on Saipan are 85 cents per can
of soda while a case of the cheapest beer costs about $20.
The Rota store employee said
because of the high prices of commodities, demand is low and stores are losing
money.
Commonwealth Ports Authority
Executive Director Christopher Tenorio in a separate interview said the broken
crane at the Rota port belongs to Rota Terminal & Transfer, a stevedoring
company.
Viola Atalig, general manager of
Rota Terminal & Transfer, which has an exclusive contract with CPA to
handle the stevedoring services at the Rota port, said: “At this time our crane
is not in service, and still under repair.”
She said they have already sent
the parts to Guam for repair “and we should be hearing from [the repair shop]
by the end of this month.”
Atalig added that they have
another crane coming from Guam “but the water these days are too rough so it
can’t be shipped to Rota.”
She said they understand the dire
situation of the people on Rota, and that’s why “we are also trying to bring in
another crane from Guam.”
Implementation of law easing rice imports to begin March 5
By CNN Philippines Staff
Updated 16:44 PM PHT Tue,
February 19, 2019
21610
The new law easing import restrictions on rice will take effect on
March 3, as approved by the policy-making National Food Authority Council
Monday. (FILE PHOTO)
Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, February 19) — The new law easing import restrictions on rice will
take effect on March 5, the Department of Finance (DOF) clarified Tuesday.
A DOF press release on Monday said that the Implementing Rules
and Regulations (IRR) of the rice tariffication law will be enacted
on March 3. The DOF is part of the National Food Authority (NFA) Council.
However, Finance Undersecretary Tony Lambino noted that since
the date of the law's publication on the Official Gazette was on February
18, the law will take effect on March 5 as approved by the
policy-making body.
Lambino pointed out during the Palace briefing that the
liberalization of rice imports is expected to cut retail prices of the staple
by ₱2 to ₱7 a kilo, which will benefit Filipinos including farmers who are net
consumers of rice.
He said the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) projects that lower
rice prices will cut the inflation rate by 0.6 percentage points.
NFA's functions, including its Food Development Center, will be
turned over to the Department of Agriculture (DA).
The Council also ordered the NFA to submit a restructuring plan
within 30 days instead of its earlier 180-day proposal.
According to the statement, Finance Secretary Carlos
"Sonny" Dominguez III presided over the meeting as
"endorsed" by Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol. Piñol was absent.
Others in the meeting were Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez,
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy Governor Diwa Guinigundo, Agriculture
Undersecretary Ariel Cayanan, and representatives of the National Economic
Development Authority.
President Rodrigo Duterte signed the bill into law on February
15. He had certified the bill as urgent in October in response to rising
commodity prices.
The law removed from the NFA its power to implement negotiable
warehouse receipts for grains, inspect grains for inventory, register, license
and supervise warehouses and mills, and to regulate the grains trade.
Businesses and individuals can now buy rice from foreign sources
and just pay the 40 percent tariff. Tax proceeds will fund programs to help
farmers such as mass irrigation, rice storage and research initiatives.
Piñol, in a Facebook post Sunday, said he will support the rice
tarriffication law amid claims he is against it.
"My personal views will not matter on whether these twin
moves should be implemented or not," Piñol said. "The Philippine
Government made these commitments to the World Trade Organization negotiations
many, many years ago and these are commitments that we must honor or else we
will face trade disputes from other WTO member countries."
Vice President
worries about 'safety nets'
Vice President Leni Robredo, however, expresed concern over the
so-called "safety nets" for farmers.
"Sana, unang una, ayusin iyong IRR, iyong implementing
rules and regulations, siguruhin na iyong mawawala sa mga farmers, mayroon
tayong pampalit-mayroon tayong pampalit na subsidies saka assistance, para
maihanda iyong ating mga magsasaka. Tapos ayusin iyong implementation. Kasi
kapag hindi natin naayos iyong IRR, kapag hindi natin naayos iyong
implementation ng safety nets, kawawa iyong ating mga magsasaka," Robredo
said in a statement.
[Translation: Hopefully, first, we fix the IRR (implementing
rules and regulations), ensure that whatever the farmers lost, we can return.
There should be subsidies and assistance ready for our farmers. And it must be
properly implemented. If we don't set the IRR up properly and we don't
implement the safety nets properly, our farmers will suffer.]
Economic managers said the law would lower rice prices, which at
a time hit ₱70 per kilogram in some areas last year. Farmer group Kilusan
ng Magbubukid ng Pilipinas wants the law scrapped, calling it a "death
warrant" for the rice industry and deny farmers of their livelihood.
This story was updated to include statements from Finance
Undersecretary Tony Lambino.
Rice tariffication: The bitter pill we need
/
·
RICE TARIFFICATION: THE BITTER PILL WE
NEED
ATTY. DODO DULAY
RICE isn’t just staple food for
most Filipinos. It is also an important political commodity such that the
supply of rice at low and stable prices has been the paramount objective of
every administration since the Commonwealth era.
With rice comprising a
significant chunk of a Filipino household’s budget — especially in low-income
groups which depend on it for as much as 65 percent of their daily calorie
intake — as well as providing a source of income to more than 3 million
farmers, thousands of traders, millers, retailers and employees in the rice
industry, fluctuations in the price of this staple impact the standard of
living of most Filipinos. Which makes the recent enactment of the rice
tariffication law all the more significant.
In another display of decisive
political will, and notwithstanding the potential decline of his political
capital, President Rodrigo Duterte signed the bill removing all import
restrictions on rice, despite the opposition (and massive PR campaign) of rice
traders, millers and so-called farmers’ groups.
In one fell swoop, the President
not only crippled the rice cartels that have lorded over rice supply and prices
in the Philippines, but also removed the regulatory and importation monopoly of
the National Food Authority (NFA), which has been mired in several corruption
scandals and has, time and again, miserably failed to provide timely, accurate
and effective intervention in the country’s rice market.
As expected, some consumer groups
complained that rice tariffication will lead to the flooding of imported rice,
making monitoring of rice imports difficult, while agriculture advocates say
opening the country to imports could lead to higher prices as foreign exporters
could manipulate supply to bring prices up.
However, the experience of other
rice-importing countries like Japan debunks the scare tactics of anti-rice
tariff factions which are obviously keen on maintaining the status quo — and
their immense profits. Despite its politicians vociferously opposing any trade
concessions, Japan nonetheless adopted the rice tariffication scheme in 1999
and has since been able to bring down rice prices by around 20 percent on the
average.
Even Malaysia, which is one of
the biggest rice importers in the region, is looking to end the rice
importation monopoly of its Padiberas Nasional Berhad (better known as Bernas)
— the Malaysian counterpart of NFA — due to corruption and mismanagement
allegations.
As it is, rice tariffication is
long overdue. The country has been enjoying the protection of quantitative
restriction (QR) on rice since joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) in
1995. In fact, rice is the only remaining commodity with a QR as the
Philippines had converted the import quotas on other agricultural products into
tariffs when Congress passed Republic Act 8178, or the “Agricultural
Tariffication Act of 1996.”
So, for more than two decades
now, the Philippines was allowed to limit the amount of rice imports through
the imposition of import quotas and permit requirements. The QR on rice was
supposed to expire in 2004 but the government, citing the need to protect its
domestic rice industry and prepare the rice sector for competition from other
countries, sought an extension in 2012 and another postponement until June 30
last year.Yet, in spite of the cap placed on rice imports, our palay farmers
are still no better off today than they were 22 years ago. Paddy tillers remain
among the poorest sectors in our country, with a poverty rate of 42 percent.
That’s because the problems plaguing the sector for many years — lack of
irrigation, inability to secure the necessary farm equipment, lack of access to
cheap credit for their production capital — have never been addressed since the
country joined the WTO during the Ramos administration.
Moreover, with a population of
over 106 million in 2018, rising at an average rate of more than 2 percent per
year, domestic rice production continues to fall short of the requirements of
Filipinos. Although every administration I can remember promised rice
self-sufficiency, the deficit in rice output runs into the millions of metric
tons annually. It was only President Duterte who called a spade, a spade. “If
you ask me, in the next how many years, we will just have to import rice. I do
not believe that we can be rice-sufficient,” said the President.
It appears the President is on
the right side of history. Unknown to many, the country has imported rice every
year since 1869 (the same year the Suez Canal opened, shortening the travel
time from the Philippines to Europe). And it’s unlikely we’ll stop rice
importations soon.
For one, the country has fewer
cultivatable lands compared to our rice-exporting Asean neighbors which have
vast river deltas conducive to rice production. Thailand, for instance, has
four times the amount of arable land per person as the Philippines. Aside from
the lack of deltas, the country suffers from numerous typhoons each year,
making rice production difficult and risky.
Given the sorry state of our rice
industry, I find it unfair to deny our citizens access to cheaper and
better-quality imported rice in the guise of attaining rice self-sufficiency or
food security.
Consider this: Vietnam at present
sells 25 percent broken white rice (the kind usually purchased by NFA and other
local importers) at $300 per metric ton in the world market. Converted into
kilograms and Philippine currency, that translates to around P15.72 per kg.
Even with a 35 percent tariff (or
import tax) under the rice tariffication law, the cost of imported Vietnam rice
would only be P20.43 per kg. Add on the expenses for cost, freight and
insurance, plus a reasonable profit margin, the cost of imported Vietnamese
rice would be around P30 a kilo, over P10 cheaper than current prices for local
grain, and about the same price as NFA rice, that is, if you can find any.
If we are to uplift the lives of
our rice farmers, the government must effectively utilize the initial
P10-billion Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund to make our rice sector more
productive and competitive through farm mechanization, farm inputs, and cheap
credit. Until then, the country has to swallow the bitter pill of rice
tariffication, as President Duterte says, “for the greater good.”
Palace vows transparency in use of P10-B
rice fund
February
19, 2019 12:13pm
By VIRGIL LOPEZ, GMA News
Malacañang on Tuesday vowed
transparency in the use of the P10-billion Rice Competitiveness Enhancement
Fund (RCEF) as safeguard against corruption.
“Good governance is the hallmark
of the Duterte administration and the President has zero tolerance against
corruption and wastage of taxpayers’ money. We continue to exercise accountability
and transparency in all levels of the bureaucracy,” presidential spokesperson
Salvador Panelo said.
Signed by President Rodrigo
Duterte on February 14, Republic Act 11203 or the Rice Tariffication Act lifts
the quantitative restrictions on rice and allow private traders to import the
commodity from countries of their choice.
The measure allows unlimited
importation of rice as long as private sector traders secure a phytosanitary
permit from the Bureau of Plant Industry and pay the 35-percent tariff on
shipments from Southeast Asia.
The law earmarks P10 billion for
the RCEF, of which P5 billion will be allotted to farm mechanization, P3
billion to seedlings and P1 billion to expanded rice credit assistance.
The fund intends to ensure that
rice imports won’t drown out the agriculture sector and rob farmers of their
livelihood.
Panelo said the Secretary of
Agriculture would be accountable and responsible for the Rice Fund.
He also said the Department of
Agriculture, in consultation with farmers’ cooperatives and organizations as
well as local government units, will validate and update the masterlist of
eligible beneficiaries, which include farmers, farmworkers, rice cooperatives
and associations.
The Congressional Oversight
Committee on Agricultural and Fisheries Modernization (COCAFM) shall also
conduct a periodic review of the Rice Fund.
Panelo urged rice farmer
representatives and stakeholders to participate in the discussion and review of
the crafting of the Rice Industry Roadmap and Internal Rules and Regulations
with other concerned government agencies to ensure the effective and efficient
implementation of the new measure, including assuring that safeguards aimed at
eliminating corruption are in place.
Rice tariffication: The bitter pill we need
·
RICE TARIFFICATION: THE BITTER PILL WE
NEED
ATTY. DODO
DULAY
RICE isn’t just staple food for most Filipinos. It is also an
important political commodity such that the supply of rice at low and stable
prices has been the paramount objective of every administration since the
Commonwealth era.
With rice comprising a
significant chunk of a Filipino household’s budget — especially in low-income
groups which depend on it for as much as 65 percent of their daily calorie
intake — as well as providing a source of income to more than 3 million
farmers, thousands of traders, millers, retailers and employees in the rice
industry, fluctuations in the price of this staple impact the standard of
living of most Filipinos. Which makes the recent enactment of the rice
tariffication law all the more significant.
In another display of decisive
political will, and notwithstanding the potential decline of his political
capital, President Rodrigo Duterte signed the bill removing all import
restrictions on rice, despite the opposition (and massive PR campaign) of rice
traders, millers and so-called farmers’ groups.
In one fell swoop, the President
not only crippled the rice cartels that have lorded over rice supply and prices
in the Philippines, but also removed the regulatory and importation monopoly of
the National Food Authority (NFA), which has been mired in several corruption
scandals and has, time and again, miserably failed to provide timely, accurate
and effective intervention in the country’s rice market.
As expected, some consumer groups
complained that rice tariffication will lead to the flooding of imported rice,
making monitoring of rice imports difficult, while agriculture advocates say
opening the country to imports could lead to higher prices as foreign exporters
could manipulate supply to bring prices up.
However, the experience of other
rice-importing countries like Japan debunks the scare tactics of anti-rice
tariff factions which are obviously keen on maintaining the status quo — and
their immense profits. Despite its politicians vociferously opposing any trade
concessions, Japan nonetheless adopted the rice tariffication scheme in 1999
and has since been able to bring down rice prices by around 20 percent on the
average.
Even Malaysia, which is one of
the biggest rice importers in the region, is looking to end the rice
importation monopoly of its Padiberas Nasional Berhad (better known as Bernas)
— the Malaysian counterpart of NFA — due to corruption and mismanagement
allegations.
As it is, rice tariffication is
long overdue. The country has been enjoying the protection of quantitative
restriction (QR) on rice since joining the World Trade Organization (WTO) in
1995. In fact, rice is the only remaining commodity with a QR as the
Philippines had converted the import quotas on other agricultural products into
tariffs when Congress passed Republic Act 8178, or the “Agricultural
Tariffication Act of 1996.”
So, for more than two decades
now, the Philippines was allowed to limit the amount of rice imports through
the imposition of import quotas and permit requirements. The QR on rice was
supposed to expire in 2004 but the government, citing the need to protect its
domestic rice industry and prepare the rice sector for competition from other
countries, sought an extension in 2012 and another postponement until June 30
last year.Yet, in spite of the cap placed on rice imports, our palay farmers
are still no better off today than they were 22 years ago. Paddy tillers remain
among the poorest sectors in our country, with a poverty rate of 42 percent.
That’s because the problems plaguing the sector for many years — lack of
irrigation, inability to secure the necessary farm equipment, lack of access to
cheap credit for their production capital — have never been addressed since the
country joined the WTO during the Ramos administration.
Moreover, with a population of
over 106 million in 2018, rising at an average rate of more than 2 percent per
year, domestic rice production continues to fall short of the requirements of
Filipinos. Although every administration I can remember promised rice
self-sufficiency, the deficit in rice output runs into the millions of metric
tons annually. It was only President Duterte who called a spade, a spade. “If
you ask me, in the next how many years, we will just have to import rice. I do
not believe that we can be rice-sufficient,” said the President.
It appears the President is on
the right side of history. Unknown to many, the country has imported rice every
year since 1869 (the same year the Suez Canal opened, shortening the travel
time from the Philippines to Europe). And it’s unlikely we’ll stop rice
importations soon.
For one, the country has fewer
cultivatable lands compared to our rice-exporting Asean neighbors which have
vast river deltas conducive to rice production. Thailand, for instance, has
four times the amount of arable land per person as the Philippines. Aside from
the lack of deltas, the country suffers from numerous typhoons each year,
making rice production difficult and risky.
Given the sorry state of our rice
industry, I find it unfair to deny our citizens access to cheaper and
better-quality imported rice in the guise of attaining rice self-sufficiency or
food security.
Consider this: Vietnam at present
sells 25 percent broken white rice (the kind usually purchased by NFA and other
local importers) at $300 per metric ton in the world market. Converted into
kilograms and Philippine currency, that translates to around P15.72 per kg.
Even with a 35 percent tariff (or
import tax) under the rice tariffication law, the cost of imported Vietnam rice
would only be P20.43 per kg. Add on the expenses for cost, freight and
insurance, plus a reasonable profit margin, the cost of imported Vietnamese
rice would be around P30 a kilo, over P10 cheaper than current prices for local
grain, and about the same price as NFA rice, that is, if you can find any.
If we are to uplift the lives of
our rice farmers, the government must effectively utilize the initial
P10-billion Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund to make our rice sector more
productive and competitive through farm mechanization, farm inputs, and cheap
credit. Until then, the country has to swallow the bitter pill of rice
tariffication, as President Duterte says, “for the greater good.”
Odisha
government to carry on with paddy purchase
Rescinding
his earlier order, Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Secretary VV Yadav asked
the district chiefs to ensure that farmers do not resort to distress sale of
paddy.
Published: 19th
February 2019 03:35 AM | Last Updated: 19th
February 2019 11:37 AM |
Representational
image of Herbicides being sprayed in a paddy field
BHUBANESWAR: Buckling
under pressure, the State Government on Monday directed Collectors of 19
districts to continue paddy procurement operations till farmers are willing to
sell their marketable surplus under the decentralised paddy procurement system.
The directive
of the State Government came in the wake of criticism from different quarters
over the February 13 order of Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare department
asking Collectors of these districts to wind up paddy procurement operations
for the current Kharif marketing season by February end.
Rescinding his
earlier order, Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare Secretary VV Yadav asked the
district chiefs to ensure that farmers do not resort to distress sale of paddy.
“It is hereby
clarified that paddy procurement operations will continue till Government
purchases the entire paddy from farmers. As enshrined in the policy, Government
is committed to procure surplus paddy from farmers who are willing to sell to
the Government as per norms,” Yadav said in his February 18 communication to
the district Collectors.
The primary
agriculture cooperative societies (PACS) and large area multi-purpose
cooperative societies (LAMPS), two official agencies engaged by Odisha State
Civil Supplies Corporation for paddy procurement, have been directed to issue
tokens to farmers. February 25 was the deadline for issuing the tokens.
“If any paddy
comes to the market yard without a token, the same must be confiscated with
immediate effect,” the letter stated. With reports of rice millers directly
purchasing paddy from farmers coming to the notice of the Government, the
department has asked field functionaries of Cooperation department to check
such irregularities.
“If any
instance comes to the notice that millers are directly purchasing paddy, then
those millers should be debarred from procurement operations immediately,”
Yadav said.
Emphasising on
close monitoring of the procurement operations, Yadav said district squads
should be on a continuous move to facilitate farmers in selling paddy to the
Government under the price support system without any irregularities committed
by millers or PACS.
“The exercise
needs to be carried out diligently in the districts as interest of the farmers
are paramount and it is to be ensured that they do not resort to distress sale
of paddy,” the letter added.
Stay up to date on all the latest Odisha news with The New Indian Express App. Download now
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Follow the instructions after that.)
Under pressure, govt
extends procurement
Updated: February 18th, 2019, 21:02 IST
Bhubaneswar: Following outrage from farmers, the state government
Monday decided to continue paddy procurement until the entire paddy stocks with
farmers are procured.
In a letter to 19 District Collectors, food supplies and
consumer welfare secretary VV Yadav said the government is committed to
procuring surplus paddy from farmers who are willing to sell paddy to the
government as per the norms. Earlier, the government had directed to complete
paddy procurement in same districts from the midnight of February 28 as the
state had already procured more than its targeted quantity of paddy.
The 19 districts are Angul, Bhadrak, Balasore, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Ganjam, Gajapati, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Kandhamal, Kendrapara, Keonjhar, Khurda, Malkangiri, Mayurbhanj, Nayagarh, Puri, Rayagada and Sundargarh.
The government reviewed its decision following discontentment among farmers from across the state due to closure of paddy procurement. The secretary warned that stern action would be taken if any irregularity is found in paddy procurement process.
“All Primary Agriculture Cooperative Societies (PACS) must be directed that they must issue tokens to farmers. Assistant registrars of cooperative society (ARCS) and other field functionaries must regularly visit the mandis and strict action must be taken against the PACS if any irregularities are detected,” Yadav wrote to Collectors of 19 districts. He warned to confiscate paddy coming to mandis without tokens. He asked the administration to ensure that the millers lift paddy only from the mandis. If any miller is found purchasing paddy directly from farmers, the government would remove him from paddy procurement process.
A district squad must visit the mandis and facilitate farmers in selling paddy and check irregularities being committed by millers or PACS, the secretary ordered. The government further instructed authorised officers to visit the mandis and rice mills regularly and share their observations through Whatsapp by every evening.
“Since payment to the farmers is initiated once the purchase data is uploaded by the PACS. So, again, it is reiterated that if a PACS fails to upload data by evening, the CSO should immediately send the squad to the PACS to verify the data,” read the letter. The Collectors were asked to ensure that the farmers do not resort to distress sale of paddy.
The 19 districts are Angul, Bhadrak, Balasore, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Ganjam, Gajapati, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Kandhamal, Kendrapara, Keonjhar, Khurda, Malkangiri, Mayurbhanj, Nayagarh, Puri, Rayagada and Sundargarh.
The government reviewed its decision following discontentment among farmers from across the state due to closure of paddy procurement. The secretary warned that stern action would be taken if any irregularity is found in paddy procurement process.
“All Primary Agriculture Cooperative Societies (PACS) must be directed that they must issue tokens to farmers. Assistant registrars of cooperative society (ARCS) and other field functionaries must regularly visit the mandis and strict action must be taken against the PACS if any irregularities are detected,” Yadav wrote to Collectors of 19 districts. He warned to confiscate paddy coming to mandis without tokens. He asked the administration to ensure that the millers lift paddy only from the mandis. If any miller is found purchasing paddy directly from farmers, the government would remove him from paddy procurement process.
A district squad must visit the mandis and facilitate farmers in selling paddy and check irregularities being committed by millers or PACS, the secretary ordered. The government further instructed authorised officers to visit the mandis and rice mills regularly and share their observations through Whatsapp by every evening.
“Since payment to the farmers is initiated once the purchase data is uploaded by the PACS. So, again, it is reiterated that if a PACS fails to upload data by evening, the CSO should immediately send the squad to the PACS to verify the data,” read the letter. The Collectors were asked to ensure that the farmers do not resort to distress sale of paddy.
Paddy fields can’t do without mechanised
farming
Sindh’s paddy sector has lately seen some
interventions aimed at mechanising cultivation, increasing per-acre yields and
improving the milling process. The provincial government’s Sindh Enterprise
Development Fund (SEDF) has supported several rice mills by absorbing most of
the mark-up component of the loan subsidy. In the forthcoming Kharif season
starting in April-May, the SEDF plans to establish companies for the provision
of laser land levellers, crop transplanters and harvesters on a rental basis.
SEDF Managing Director Mahboob Kazi said the Sindh government was being
approached in this regard keeping in view the encouraging trend among millers
who availed the subsidy in the last two years. A rice miller could avail a loan
of Rs10m for an upgrade of their mill. The SEDF has tried to prevail upon the
State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) to make sure that commercial bank liberalise their
loan regimes for rice millers as well as farmers.
‘The hybrid seed variety has increased paddy
production, but the related infrastructure is still missing’
The SEDF absorbs six per cent of the mark-up
while 2pc is borne by the borrower. Eight rice mill owners availed this
facility between 2012 and 2016. However, 22 mills underwent the much-needed
upgrade in the last two years, according to Mr Kazi. “New machinery has reduced
the level of electricity consumption by the miller. It has also decreased the
ratio of broken rice during milling,” he said. This trend is encouraging from
the SEDF’s point of view. Therefore, it aims to ensure the provision of laser
land levellers, transplanters and harvesters for paddy growers through rental
service-providers. Laser land levellers ensure uniformity in water distribution
at the cultivation and post-cultivation stages as paddy remains a high-delta
crop. It helps save 30-40pc of water that is otherwise lost in any piece of
uneven farmland. Similarly, transplanters and harvesters contribute to the
overall increased farm productivity. Manual transplantation of seedlings is
labour-intensive, tedious and time-consuming. In contrast, mechanised
transplantation substantially increases the plant population up to 100,000 per
acre which, according to paddy grower Nabi Bux Sathio, varies around
50,000-70,000 plants per acre in the manual process. Mechanised transplantation
increases productivity by 20 maunds an acre which is usually assessed at 50-60
maunds.
Harvesters substantially save grain losses at
the harvesting stage. Keeping such losses within 15pc translates into revenue
of half a billion dollars, according to Rice Exporters Association Pakistan
(Reap) Chairman Safdar Mehkri. He said paddy growers in Pakistan produce 2.7
million tonnes of rice per hectare against 9.2m tonnes in the United States.
“We have a net potential of $5bn rice exports. But we are currently fetching
$2bn because of gaps at the cultivation, harvesting, storage and milling
stages,” he remarked. He said Pakistan can increase its rice production to
12.5m tonnes from 7.4m tonnes by adopting mechanisation. In 2018-19, paddy
production in Sindh dropped to 2.5m tonnes against the target of 2.7m tonnes
(the 2017-18 production estimate is 2.85m tonnes).
The cropped area declined to 690,000 acres
against the target of 770,000 acres. The drop in the area and production was
attributed to a water shortage at the peak of sowing in Kharif 2018
(April-June). Water flows, as per figures by the irrigation department, stood
at 6.453MAF in April-June in 2018 against 11.22MAF in the corresponding period
of 2017, showing an overall shortfall of 42.5pc in the last crop season. Paddy
is grown mainly in the right-bank areas of upper Sindh. In lower Sindh, it was
cultivated in Badin, Thatta, Tando Mohammad Khan and Sujawal districts. The
quality of seeds also hampered overall growth in the paddy sector. Farmers
prefer the imported hybrid variety that paddy growers like Nadeem Shah believe
was hit by germination and fruit-setting issues.
“It is basically weather conditions that vary
between Sindh and countries like Australia, United States and China that
produce these seeds,” he observed. The higher yield potential of hybrid seeds
attracts growers. At the same time, this variety also demands vital inputs like
zinc, magnesium, pesticides and fertiliser besides timely water flows for
better productivity. This increases the overall cost of production. According
to Mr Shah, local varieties like DR-82, Shandar, Irri-6 and Irri-9 also give
higher yields with better inputs. He levelled his land in the Sujawal district
by laser levellers to overcome water losses and have uniform irrigation water
distribution. Post-harvest losses during milling reduce the overall production
of refined rice. With outdated machinery, rice millers have to make do with
losses in production. As a result, the ratio of broken rice increases. The
SEDF’s assessment showed upgraded machinery in a rice mill improves the
production capacity, making a difference of four to five tonnes on average. Mr
Mehkri noted that the hybrid variety has indeed increased paddy production, but
the related infrastructure is still missing.
The crop
was not dried, although driers are available. The tendency to use these driers
is too little. He added that equipment rental companies exist in Punjab, but
the idea has not gained popularity here. “Commercial banks avoid offering loans
to millers and farmers,” he said. He referred to rice production in Vietnam which
attracted a price over and above the going rate of $110-$150 per tonne in the
international market. “With upgraded mills and increased rice production, we
can capture markets in the Middle East and other regions. Mechanised farming
can offset the impact of the water shortage at the field level,” he asserted.
Published in Dawn, The Business and Finance Weekly, February 18th, 2019
https://www.dawn.com/news/1464537/paddy-fields-cant-do-without-mechanised-farming
Drop in rice prices due to market
speculation
MANILA — Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel “Manny”
Piñol clarified that the fall in the buying price of rice by commercial traders
is the result of speculation, which was fueled by the anticipated “flooding” of
the market with cheap imported rice under a liberalized market. This is in view
of the disinformation surrounding the newly-enacted Rice Tariffication Law’s
effect on the local rice industry, to the point that the buying price of palay
has dropped from a high of PHP22 per kilo last year to PHP14 and PHP15 in some
parts of the country now. Piñol said the Rice Tariffication Law has just been
signed by President Rodrigo Duterte and is not effective yet. “There is a
period within which the public will be notified and the Implementing Rules and
Regulations (IRR) still have to be finalized,” he explained. And even if the
importers would want to bring in huge volumes of imported rice, the DA chief
said there is not much rice supply available in the world market. “As it is
now, the volume of rice traded in the world market every year is only about
40-million metric tons (MT) of which about 38-million (MT) is already committed
to specific non-rice producing countries,” he said. “The world population is
growing exponentially while the land area is constant and this is true with
rice exporting countries like Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Pakistan and
Myanmar,” he added. The DA chief said a few years from now, Thailand and
Vietnam will not be able to export the same volume of rice as they do today
because they also have growing populations. “The Philippines cannot let go of
its own Rice Production Program because the moment it becomes dependent on
imported rice, even on a short term, it will end up at the mercy of the rice
exporters who could sell their produce at an even higher price than our
domestic cost of production,” he noted. Piñol said that the view that some
economists are peddling that the Philippines would be better off just importing
rice rather than producing it locally is “a short-sighted perspective”. “If
this view prevails, the Philippines will face a real rice crisis a few years
from now with sky-high prices which the poor cannot afford,” he said. Piñol,
however, admitted that initially, there would be a drop in the buying price of
palay “but the farmers are expected to adjust by increasing productivity with
funds coming from tariffication.” Under the Rice Tariffication Law, a provision
states that the tariffs and duties collected from the rice importation — 35
percent for ASEAN members and 50 percent for other sources — shall be turned
over to the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF), estimated at no less
than PHP10-billion annually. For 2019, Piñol said about PHP5 billion of the
PHP10-billion RCEF will be allocated for farm mechanization; PHP3-billion for
high-yielding seeds; PHP1-billion for credit; and PHP1-billion for technical
skills training. “Properly used, the RCEF could actually increase the
productivity of Filipino rice farmers because farm mechanization alone will
increase production efficiency and reduce post-harvest losses estimated at 16
percent of total production,” he said. The DA chief explained that the
PHP3-billion intended for high-yielding seeds developed by the International
Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and Philippine Rice Research Institute
(PhilRice) is also expected to increase average farm yield by at least two MT
in one-million hectares for the first year of implementation. On the other
hand, the PHP1-billion credit facility will also allow farmers to buy
fertilizers and other farm inputs, thus increasing their productivity, while
the P1-B for technical skills training is expected to improve their farming
technology, he said. Piñol also stressed that he is supporting the lifting of
the Quantitative Restrictions (QR) on rice importation. He reiterated that the
Rice Tariffication Law was the commitment of the Philippines to the World Trade
Organization WTO) negotiations many years ago “and these are commitments that
we must honor or else we will face trade disputes from other WTO member
countries.” “Of course, I have to admit that I had my reservations on the
provisions of the law, which takes out the regulatory powers of the National
Food Authority (NFA), but these are now settled with the signing of the bill
into law. I am a government worker and I will abide by the policy set by the
administration and work to ensure its successful implementation,” he added.
Rice
insurance continues
A rice farmer in Ayutthaya’s Bang
Sai district takes a break from her routine work in the fields. (Photo by
Pattanapong Hirunard) The cabinet has approved a rice insurance scheme for the
2019 season worth... Please credit and share this article with others
using this link:https://www.bangkokpost.com/business/news/1631150/rice-insurance-continues.
A
prophecy of rice export
Last
year may be considered a good year for Vietnam’s rice export sector. There
remain complicated issues to address, though.
Vietnam
exported around 6.1 million tons of rice in 2018, a year-on-year rise of 4.6%,
or an equivalent of 270,000 tons, according to the General Statistics Office
(GSO). Those tallies undoubtedly prove to be modest rises compared with over
one million tons and 21%, respectively, in 2017.
Despite
a slight upsurge in the volume of rice export, Vietnamese rice prices were
high, making last year a success for the sector. Each ton of rice was sold at
an average US$502, which was 10.8% higher than in 2017. As a result, 2018 rice
export turnover surged by 16% to top US$3 billion.
What’s
more, that Vietnamese rice prices were equal to, or sometime higher than, those
offered by her rival, Thailand, should require careful analysis.
Calculations
based on Thai and Vietnamese statistics show that Vietnam’s average rice price
was between US$7 and US$9 per ton higher than Thailand’s during 2016-2017. In
2018, the gap no longer existed, resulting in an equal price of US$502 per ton.
Two
plausible reasons can be given at a time to explain the price
increase—Vietnamese exporters were able to considerably enhance both their
glutinous and fragrant rice export segments at much better prices. For a
comparison, in 2017, Vietnam shipped abroad more than three million tons of
these rice catgories—which accounted for 46.4% of the total—and significantly
reduced the amount of white rice. In contrast, Thailand decreased the export
volume of her Thai Hom Mali fragrant rice exports, from 31.7% down to 20.1%,
and, at the same time, made every effort to sell off her huge stocks—the
consequence of ineffective policies—at dirt-cheap prices.
Some
uncertainties down the road
Despite
last year’s achievements, Vietnam will confront both existing and new obstacles
when it comes to rice export.
First,
it seems that Vietnamese exporters prefer to sell their products at high
prices, and are thus unable to sell out their rice stockpiles. It is possible
to push up rice export prices so as to maximize profits. However, if such price
hikes are likely to curb competitiveness, one should think twice. Therefore, a
revision of rice prices to clinch a bigger market share remains a burning issue
on the Vietnamese side.
Statistics
show that Vietnam’s rice export volume was 6.1 million tons last year, while
her rice-equivalent production was almost triple. Consequently, around
half a million tons of rice could have not been sold on the global market—just
as what happened a few years ago.
In
2018, Thailand outperformed Vietnam in the latter’s traditional Southeast Asian
markets. Between January and November 2018, Thai rice traders shipped a total
of 2.12 million tons to Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines, which was
100,000 tons higher than Vietnam’s volume.
Secondly,
China’s recent moves may put Vietnam’s rice export in a dilemma if what the
United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has predicted becomes a reality.
According
to the USDA, although the total worldwide rice production in 2019 is projected
to decrease by nearly four million tons, rice stocks around the globe at the
beginning of the year jumps sharply to an unprecedented record of nearly 162
million tons—or more than four months of rice consumption in the world. Meanwhile,
the demand for rice import is put at some 45 million tons, the same as in 2018.
However,
what is more important for Vietnam is she may have to witness a drastic decline
in rice import from her second largest rice buyer in 2018, Indonesia, which is
scheduled to ship in only 800,000 tons from Vietnam this year versus 2.15
million tons this country did last year.
Additionally,
China is taking some measures to tighten rice import in a bid to reduce the
country’s increasingly rapid rice stockpiles. Currently, China’s rice reserves
have amounted to around 109 million tons, equivalent to 279 days of
consumption, and the figure may continue to rise to 113 million tons at the end
of 2019.
Viewed
from these two largest markets, Vietnam’s rice export sector should brace
itself for difficulties ahead.
Third,
in spite of the impressive price hikes of glutinous and fragrant rice in recent
years, ‘made in Vietnam’ fragrant rice is still sold at the lowest prices among
rice exporters in the world.
According
to Thai rice exporters, their Hom Mali fragrant rice and its Indian equivalent
called Basmati are now bought at US$1,127 and US$1,450 per ton, respectively.
Hom Mali’s Vietnamese counterpart, jasmine rice, is way below, hovering around
US$488-492 per ton.
Therefore,
creating new fragrant rice strains capable of selling at remarkably higher
prices is poised to play the key role in giving a new lease of life to
Vietnamese rice in the international marketplace.
Rice export prices fall in top Asian hubs
HANOI: Rice export prices fell in top Asian hubs this week on slow
demand and rising supply following a quiet start to the year, while limited
interest from the Philippines failed to spur a Vietnamese market reeling from
Chinese import restrictions. In top exporter India, 5 percent broken
parboiled variety eased to $380-$385 per tonne from $383-$388 last week as
supply from the winter crop poured in. Demand from Asian and African
buyers was subdued, an exporter based in Kakinada in the southern state of
Andhra Pradesh said. India’s rice exports between April and December
dropped 10.2 percent from a year earlier to 8.46 million tonnes, a government
body said last week. In Thailand, benchmark 5 percent broken rice prices
fell to $382-$398 a tonne, free on board Bangkok, from $390-$402
previously. “The market has been really quiet and new supply of rice is
coming out now,” a Bangkok-based trader said. A weaker domestic currency
was adding further pressure to prices, traders said. “More supply will
lower prices further but exporters are still looking for buyers because it has
really been quiet since the start of the year,” another trader said.
Thailand is the world’s second biggest rice exporter followed by Vietnam, where
rates for benchmark 5 percent broken rice fell to $340 a tonne from $350 two
weeks ago before the markets closed for the Lunar New Year holiday.
“Trade has resumed and we have seen more buyers from the Philippines placing
orders,” a trader based in Ho Chi Minh City said, adding that private buyers
from rice-scarce Philippines purchased about 20,000 tonnes this week.
However, China has been imposing stricter conditions for rice imports from
Vietnam, traders said. China will likely cut rice shipments from Vietnam
to 500,000-600,000 tonnes this year from around 1.5-2 million tonnes a year in
the past, another trader said. “We think the government will likely buy
rice this year for stockpiling, giving a support for domestic prices.”
Export prices, however, will be under pressure as the major winter-spring
harvest peaks by month-end, traders said. Elsewhere, Bangladesh, which
saw imports surge in 2017 after floods wreaked havoc on local crops, will
procure more rice locally as output has revived a food ministry official from
the country said. “We are getting good response in our local procurement
drive and will continue it,” the official said. Bangladesh has procured
nearly 1.4 million tonnes of rice locally so far in the current season to build
state reserves.—Reuters
Rice tariff law to boost
farmers’ profitability
President Duterte’s economic managers identified rice
tariffication as among the measures that would help address soaring inflation.
Cecille Suerte Felipe (The Philippine
Star) - February 17, 2019 - 12:00am
MANILA, Philippines — The
P10-billion Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund in the newly signed Rice
Tarrification Law will help farmers improve their profitability and
competitiveness, Sen. Cynthia Villar said yesterday
“We thank and laud the President
for signing into law the bill creating a package of support programs for
farmers, most notably the P10-billion Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund.
With the expiration of the quantitative restriction on rice importation, this
is a very important piece of legislation which will help our farmers improve
their profitability and competitiveness,” Villar said.
Villar, sponsor and principal
author of the measure, said the law complements other government programs to
address the needs of the farming sector, including the P7-billion Rice Program
under the Department of Agriculture and the P7-billion budget of the National
Food Authority that will be used to buy palay from local farmers for purposes
of buffer stocking.
President Duterte’s economic
managers identified rice tariffication as among the measures that would help
address soaring inflation.
The measure would create the Rice
Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF) as a special rice safeguard duty to
protect the rice industry from sudden or extreme price fluctuations.
“One of the key features of the
bill is the creation of the RCEF, which shall consist of initial appropriation
of P10 billion a year until all duties collected from the importation of rice
can replace it,” Villar said.
The Senate agreed to set the RCEF
at a minimum P10 billion a year for six years, and tariff revenues in excess of
P10 billion shall be appropriated by Congress based on a menu of programs in
the rice tariffication law.
The fund will be utilized to
provide different forms of assistance to the country’s rice farmers such as the
development of inbred rice seeds, the development of rice farm equipment and
skills enhancement.
Villar said the staple grain is
the only agricultural commodity in the country that has a quantitative
restriction (QR), limiting the inflow of imported rice in the country.
The law replaces volume
restrictions on rice importation with tariffs of up to 35 percent. It would
allow unlimited rice importation.
Some lawmakers at the House of
Representatives, however, declared they would seek the repeal of the law,
claiming it would hurt the 2.4 million Filipino farmers.
Speaking for the seven Makabayan
group of leftist lawmakers, Rep. Ariel Casilao of Anakpawis said they would
file a bill to repeal the law when it takes effect 15 days after its
publication.
Casilao said he and his
colleagues could not accept that Filipinos would rely on imported rice, instead
of producing the staple.
He said the law threatens the
livelihood of millions of Filipino farmers, farm workers and small rice
traders.
Former Quezon congressman and
opposition senatorial candidate Lorenzo ‘Erin’ Tañada questioned the premise
that the passage of the Rice Tariffication Law result in lower prices of rice
in the market.
Tañada said senators should
ensure that the law is properly implemented, as he expressed apprehensions that
the law might have negative effects on farmers.
While Casilao and his Makabayan
colleagues are not happy with President Duterte’s decision to sign the
tariffication bill, congressmen-allies of the administration welcomed it and
called for its speedy implementation.
“This crucial legislation is
meant to ensure ample rice supply and cheaper rice for all consumers. We risk
upsetting rice supplies again when the lean months of July to September come if
the rice tariff law is not implemented fast enough,” Rep. Michael Romero of
party-list group 1-Pacman said.
Romero said the administration’s
economic managers are projecting that once ample supply is brought in, rice
prices could go down by as much as P7 per kilo.
Another congressman, Luis Raymund
Villafuerte of Camarines Sur, said tariffs to be imposed on rice imports would
go to a fund that farmers could access to finance their production
requirements.
“The law, which will liberalize
rice importation, will at the same time benefit consumers, who include farmers.
It will benefit poor households the most, given that rice accounts for 20
percent of their consumption,” he said. – Jess Diaz
<
>
Philippines liberates rice market
ASEAN+ February 18, 2019 01:00
By PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER
ASIA NEWS NETWORK
MANILA
ASIA NEWS NETWORK
MANILA
THE PHILIPPINES'
Rice Tariffication Bill has been signed into law by President Duterte amid
opposition from farmer groups and consistent prodding from economic managers
and business organisations.
The measure, considered a priority
bill of the Duterte administration, will effectively open the country’s doors
to unimpeded importation of rice and provide an annual subsidy of 10 billion
peso (Bt6 billion) for the development of the rice industry.
Economic managers and 13 business
organisations had thrown their support for the law, noting that its enactment
would help temper the country’s inflation, bring down retail prices of rice in
the market and harness the country’s ability to ensure food security.
However, industry groups, including
the Federation of Free Farmers, Alyansa ng Magbubukid and Bantay Bigas, had
urged Duterte to veto the bill, citing issues of smuggling and corruption in
the rice trade as well as the limited role of the National Food Authority (NFA)
under the law.
Under the tariff regime, the NFA
would be limited to maintaining the country’s emergency stocks in time of
calamities and would not be allowed to license importers and regulate the entry
of imported rice in the market.
It was not clear if it would still
be allowed to sell subsidised rice in the market.
Acting NFA Administrator Tomas
Escarez said details of the agency’s function would be tackled in the
implementing rules and regulations of the law, which has yet to be released.
The Rice Tariffication Law allows
the market to be flooded with rice imports so long as these are slapped a
tariff at 35 per cent if coming from Asean members and 50 per cent for
non-Asean states.
Around 28 billion peso in revenues
are expected to be collected by the government from these imports, which would
be used to subsidise rice farmers to ensure their competitiveness.
Senator Cynthia Villar, chair of
the Senate committee on food and agriculture and the proponent of the bill,
said that the money should be used to mechanise and modernise the sector, which
has been lagging behind other rice-producing countries.
Unlike in Vietnam and Thailand
where farmers can produce a kilo of rice at 6 peso, Filipino farmers incur a
production cost of 12 peso a kilo, making local rice costlier than imported
rice.
Whether or not relying on rice
imports would benefit both local producers and consumers of the staple remains
to be seen.
Right now, the challenge is to make
sure that rice farmers can compete at a price 35-per cent higher than imported
rice, and give consumers the option to avail themselves of the staple at a more
affordable price.
Philippine
farmers attack law lifting rice import limits
Say cheap imports will flood local market putting
their livelihoods under threat
Farmers end another day of harvesting on a farm north of Manila.
Philippine farmers are complaining over a lack of government support for rice
production in the country. (Photo by Mark Saludes)
Mark Saludes, Manila
Philippines
February 18, 2019
Philippines
February 18, 2019
Farmers in the Philippines have voiced anger over a new law
liberalizing the importation of rice, saying it directly threatens local rice
production.
The Peasant Movement of the Philippines described the law as
"a death sentence for the local rice industry and farmers."
Danilo Ramos, chairman of the farmers' organization, claimed the
lives of about 13.5 million Filipino rice farmers, 17.5 million farm workers,
20,000 rice retailers, and 55,000 rice mill workers would be seriously
effected.
"It's the beginning of the end of the local rice
industry," said Ramos, adding the local rice industry will not stand a
chance against rice imports, despite financial support from the government.
Bishop Arturo Bastes of Sorsogon supported the farmers, saying
that with cheaper imported rice flooding the market, young Filipinos will never
become farmers.
"They have already lost the desire because of extreme poverty. Now,
because of unregulated rice importation, no one would want to plant rice in our
own land," the prelate said.
Bishop Bastes said the new law would only force the Philippines to
become dependent on neighboring countries for a staple food.
"That law will make us a weaker and poorer country because
our farmers are being neglected," he said.
The new law will impose taxes instead of limiting the amount of
imported rice entering the country.
It will enforce a 35-percent tariff on rice importations from
Southeast Asian states and 50 percent on imports from countries that are not
members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Food security advocates have also opposed the law, warning against
its effects on local rice production.
Renmin Crisanta Vizconde, executive director of the Philippine Network
of Food SecurityProgrammes,
said the law would not reduce the high price of rice and other agricultural
commodities.
She said the law "favors rice cartels, traders and
capitalists" even as farmers suffer "due to extreme and unprecedented
economic instability."
Independent think-tank, the Ibon Foundation, noted that Filipino
farmers are unproductive and local rice is expensive "because of
long-standing government neglect."
In recent years, the government has allocated no more than five
percent of the national budget to agriculture.
Full impact of rice tariffs not felt till early Q2–Neda
February 18, 2019
By Cai U. Ordinario & Jovee
Marie N. dela Cruz
FILIPINOS cannot enjoy the
supposed benefits of rice tariffication until early next quarter, according to
the National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) and local economists.
Socioeconomic Planning Secretary
Ernesto M. Pernia told the BusinessMirror the P2- to P7-per-kilogram reduction
in rice prices could be felt around March or April or even later, depending on
the supply and demand for rice.
Neda Undersecretary for Planning
and Policy Rosemarie G. Edillon said the lag time could even stretch to the
last part of the second quarter or in the third quarter. The impact on
agriculture productivity, she added, could take even longer at around one to
two years.
“[Reduction in rice prices will
be felt] when supply from tariffied imports, as opposed to NFA’s [National Food
Authority]MAV [Minimum Access Volume] imports, matches or exceeds demand for
rice,” Pernia said via SMS on Sunday.
Edillon said others factors that
could affect the impact of the new law on rice prices include global supply and
demand. She said the estimate of a P2- to P7-per-kilogram reduction of rice
prices is based on global prices, a tariff of 35 percent, and logistics costs.
However, under the newly signed
law, tariff rates can be adjusted by the President. Edillon said this can
happen when there are extreme weather events, such as a bad case of El Niño.
Alyansa ng Industriyang Bigas
(Anib) Founding Chairman Robert Hernandez said he supports the Neda’s
pronouncement that the effect of the rice tariffication law on the prices of
the staple could be seen by March or April.
Port congestion, logistics woes
However, Hernandez cautioned that
the present port congestion, particularly at the Manila International Container
Terminal (MICT), could increase importers’ total costs, which would effectively
add on to the retail value of the staple.
Hernandez said Anib applied to
import 10,000 metric tons (MT) of rice under the NFA’s out-quota program but
they have already faced problems in unloading 10,000 MT of the volume in the
MICT due to port congestion.
The 10,000 MT imported by Anib
arrived on February 9 but has yet to be unloaded at the MICT and the group will
soon incur additional costs due to demurrage, according to Hernandez.
Due to the problem, Anib was
forced to divert the remaining 380 containers or about 9,500 MT of rice, which
are yet to be imported, to Subic port for unloading there in order to avoid
additional costs in MICT, he added. However, Hernandez said the change in port
of discharge would still entail them additional costs, which would be added on
to the price of the bag imported, due to more expensive trucking costs.
“The trucking costs of
transporting the rice from Subic port to our Bocaue warehouse would be double
or even triple the trucking cost if it would be unloaded from MICT,” he said.
“[Because of the higher trucking
costs] we would be incurring additional costs of P10 per bag. But [the
additional cost] would be even higher if our containers stay in MICT, so it is
better to divert the remaining containers now to Subic [to cut additional
costs],” he added.
Hernandez urged the government to
address the port congestion concerns in MICT, especially with the anticipated
influx of imported rice abroad. Any delays in unloading would mean higher price
of rice as importers would just pass on the additional costs they incurred,
plus prolonged unloading time could cause quality of the staple to deteriorate,
he added.
“In the rice business, timing is
of the essence. We might lose clients if we missed to supply them on the right
time. When there is demand then you should have the stock. If you could not
supply them right away then they might find another supplier,” Hernandez said.
However, Edillon said the
government expects the port congestion problem to be “easily resolved.”
She said rice importation is an
easy fix since importers can get their shipments from other ports nationwide.
Edillon said the inspection required for rice shipments is not as complicated
as other goods.
Special Customs window
House Committee on Agriculture
and Food Chairman Jose Panganiban Jr. added that there was a provision in the
newly signed law that will allow the Bureau of Customs (BOC) to open a special
window for rice importation.
Rice imports will be part of the
BOC’s National Single Window program, which seeks to facilitate trade
transactions 180 days from the effectivity of the law in accordance with
Executive Order (EO) 482.
The Philippines National Single
Window will facilitate trade through efficiencies in the Customs and
authorization processes. Strongly supported by the Office of the President and
mandated to be implemented via EO 482, the NSW will allow single submission and
accelerated processing of applications for licenses, permits and other
authorizations required prior to undertaking a trade transaction.
“We can use other ports,
especially if its rice which only requires one kind of inspection, so it can be
processed easily. I think it [port congestion] can be resolved immediately,
there are alternatives, [there are] solutions that we can suggest, recommend,”
Edillon said.
Depends on IRR
Economists such as University of
Asia and the Pacific School of Economics Dean Cid Terosa and Philippine
Institute for Development Studies Senior Research Fellow Roehlano Briones said
the impact of the tariffication will also depend on the government’s efforts in
crafting the implementing rules and regulations (IRR).
Terosa hopes the IRR will be
completed before the dry season. “There will definitely be a lag. Given the
urgency of the bill, I hope the IRR to be processed before the start of the dry
season.”
Briones, for his part said, said
the content of the IRR will be crucial. He said that if the National Food
Authority (NFA) will still control the importation at least during the
transition period, this will reduce the impact of the tariffication law on rice
prices.
Meanwhile, Action for Economic
Reform (AER) Coordinator Filomeno Sta. Ana III said that, while there will be
transition problems, the impact of the rice tariffication is already being felt
with commodity prices declining.
Many economists chimed in on the
issue and even extended their congratulations to the President’s economic team
for passing a law that has languished in Congress for 30 years.
“[The rice tariffication law]
will manage inflation expectations. In fact, food inflation has already slowed
down,” Sta. Ana told the BusinessMirror.
The landed cost of a 50-kilogram
bag of imported rice with 5-percent brokens from Vietnam is about P1,650, while
those sourced from Thailand are priced at around P1,700 per bag, Hernandez
said. This means that rice that is 5-percent brokens from Vietnam is about P34
per kilogram, while those from Thailand is around P33 per kilogram at
wholesale, Hernandez added.
Based on the list published by
the NFA on its web site about 180 farmers cooperatives, organizations,
businesses and private traders have applied to import rice —amounting to about
1.185 million metric tons under its out-quota program. Of the total applied
volume only around 55,134 MT of imported rice has entered the country, the NFA
list as of February 11 showed.
With a report from Jasper Y.
Arcalas
Rice tariff law has education component, roles
for SUCs
By HORPublished on February 16, 2019
Cong.
Bong Belaro (file photo)
QUEZON
CITY, Feb. 16 -- Little-known and often overlooked aspects of rice
tariffication are the roles of higher and vocational education, 1-Ang Edukasyon
Party-list Rep. Bong Belaro pointed out. 
"Rice
scholarships, vocational education, research, extension services, and
technology development and transfer are all provided for in the rice tariff
measure," said Rep. Belaro, a farmer's son.
"To
make sure those provisions are implemented, the chairperson of the Commission
on Higher Education is tasked to serve on the executive committee of the
Agricultural Competitiveness Enhancement Fund," he noted.
Belaro
said the CHED chairperson's participation in the ACEF cannot be delegated.
"There
is no provision for an alternate or designated representative because Congress
made it a matter of policy to place the CHED chairperson there and make his
ACEF role a priority," the Bicolano congressman said.
"The
CHED chairperson also happens to be the chairman of all the governing boards of
state universities and colleges. That role enables the CHED chair to mobilize
state universities and colleges," he added.
Belaro
said the CHED chairperson can exercise leadership by steering the SUCs so that
they maximize their contribution to agriculture growth.
"This
is a window of opportunity for the CHED to convince the Filipino youth to have
careers in agribusiness, farm technologies, and farming itself," the
congressman said. (HOR)
Duterte signs
rice law
Last
updated Feb 18, 2019
By Prince Golez
Malacanang on Monday released a
signed copy of the law, lifting quantitative restrictions (QR) on rice
importation.
Republic Act (RA) 11203 seeks to
remove the QR on rice imports to allow private merchants to bring in rice from
other countries.
“Any and all laws, rules,
regulations, guidelines, and other issuances imposing quantitative export
restrictions on rice are hereby repealed,” the new law said.
Under RA 11203, the exportation
of rice will be allowed in accordance with the established rules, regulations,
and guidelines.
Signed by President Rodrigo
Duterte on February 14, 2019, the measure also created the Rice Competitiveness
Enhancement Fund, which will have an annual appropriation of P10 billion for
the next six years.
The Rice Fund will be allocated
and disbursed to rice producing areas such as rice farm machinery and
equipment, rice seed development, propagation, and promotion, expanded rice
credit assistance, and rice extension services.
Tolentino bats for strengthening agricultural high schools to ensure
food security
Last
updated Feb 19, 2019
By JOHN CARLO M. CAHINHINAN
VIGAN CITY, Ilocos Sur –
Administration senatorial bet Francis Tolentino wants to amend the existing K
to 12 curriculum of the Department of Education to revitalize the county’s
agricultural high schools.
In his speech during proclamation
rally of Mayor Sara Duterte’s Hugpong ng Pagbabago in Vigan, Tolentino said
strengthening the agricultural high schools in the countryside was the key in
achieving rice and food sufficiency for the entire nation.
“Long term sa mga kabataan,
ibalik natin ang mga agricultural high school. Palakasin natin yung enrollment
ng UP Los Baños at iba’t-ibang agricultural schools,” he said.
Tolentino expressed concern about
the more than 10 percent drop in the enrollment rate in schools that offered
agricultural courses such as the University of the Philippines-Los Baños.
The former mayor of Tagaytay City
warned that the lack of interest of the present generation when it comes to
farming might lead to a nationwide food shortage unless they will be
enlightened when it comes to agricultural matters.
He added that the sense of
corporate farming should be revived and the country’s top 100 companies should
help the present generation of farmers.
Duterte signs law creating National Secondary School Career Guidance
and Counseling Program
Last
updated Feb 19, 2019
By Prince Golez
With the signing of Republic Act (RA) 11206 or the Secondary
School Career Guidance and Counseling Act, Filpino students are now expected to
make the right career decisions.
The law, signed last February 14, 2019, creates a National
Secondary and Counseling Program (CGCP), commencing at the Grade 7 level, that
would help students decide which college course best fits them.
The CGCP, to be administered by the Department of Education
(DepEd), will be a prerequisite for senior high school students before
graduation.
Under Section 5 of RA 11206, the CGEP Center in all secondary
schools will be headed by the school administrator and assisted by a trained
career and employment guidance counselor.
“The DepEd, through the National Education Testing and Reseach
Center, shall conduct an annual National Career Assessment Examination among students
in the appropriate grade level in all public and private secondary schools
nationwide as a tool to assess and evaluate the aptitude, skills or inclination
of the students in a particular occupational field and to serve as guide for
the students in choosing their respective courses or career options,” the
measure read.
Duterte signs law on
creation of Department of Human Settlements and Urban Development
Last updated Feb 19, 2019
By Prince Golez
A bill creating the Department of
Human Settlements and Urban Development has been enacted into law.
President Rodrigo Duterte signed
Republic Act (RA) 11201, which consolidates the Housing and Urban Development
Coordinating Council and the Housing and Land Use Regulatory Board, on February
14, 2019.
Under the law, the new department
will act as the primary national government entity responsible for the
management of housing, human settlement, and urban development.
It will serve as the sole and
main planning and policy-making, regulatory, program coordination, and
performance monitoring entity for all housing, human settlement, and urban
development concerns, primarily focusing on the access to and the affordability
of basic human needs.
Also, the Department of Human
Settlements and Urban Development is tasked to develop and adopt a national
strategy to immediately address the provision of adequate and affordable
housing to all Filipinos.
Section 6 of the law provides
that, the department will compose of the Office of the Secretary, and the
various bureaus, services, and regional offices.
It will be headed by a Secretary
and assisted by four Undersecretaries and four Assistant Secretaries to be
appointed by the President.
NFA
Council to meet Monday to discuss IRR of rice tariffication law
Published February 17, 2019 4:17pm
The National Food Authority
Council is set to meet on Monday, February 18, to start fine-tuning the
implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of the rice tariffication law.
In an interview on GMA Super
Radyo dzBB on Sunday, NFA OIC Administrator Tomas Escarez said the NFA Council
will meet tomorrow to start discussions on the IRR of the law which removed the
quantitative restrictions on rice imports.
"Bukas ng umaga,
magco-convene ang NFA Council para i-finalize... para dito sa implementing
rules and regulations," he said.
"Kasama kami sa technical
working group pero 'yung final decision dito ay magsisimula sa NFA
Council," added Escarez.
Presidential Spokesperson
Salvador Panelo last week confirmed that Duterte approved the measure that would
effectively impose a 25-percent tariff on imports from neighbors in Southeast
Asia.
Among those to be discussed,
according to Escarez, are the "gray areas" regarding the future of
the NFA and what the agency's mandate would be moving forward.
According to Escarez, it is still
unclear if the regulatory powers of the NFA would be removed, and if it would
instead be confined to ensuring that the country has a sufficient buffer stock
to cater to the Philippines' demands.
"Kung iko-confine kami sa
buffer-stocking, titignan natin 'yung optimal level na kailangang
i-maintain," said Escarez.
The measure allows unlimited
importation of rice as long as private sector traders secure a phyto-sanitary
permit from the Bureau of Plant Industry and pay the 35-percent tariff for
shipments from neighbors in Southeast Asia.
The law earmarks P10 billion for
the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund, of which P5 billion will be allotted
to farm mechanization and P3 billion to seedlings. The fund intends to ensure
that rice imports won’t drown out the agriculture sector and rob farmers of
their livelihood. —Jon Viktor Cabuenas/LBG, GMA
News
Rice farming in
Zanzibar set to receive a boost
Zanzibar needs at least 80,000 tonnes of rice annually to meet
the needs of its population, but the struggle to increase production has so far
resulted in production of less than 50,000 tonnes last year.
That means the country has to
continue relying heavily on imports to feed its more than 1.3 million people
(2012 census) as its efforts to increase or produce enough continues with
support from foreign countries particularly South Korea, Indonesia, and China.
The government has been making intensive efforts to improve the
agricultural sector, particularly since 2011 when Ali Mohamed Shein, shortly
after taking over as President introduced ,”The Agriculture
Revolution/Transformation Program” with aim to double or triple rice production
to reduce dependence on imported rice.
Despite existing and emerging challenges in farming which
include insufficient or lack of modern skills and technology and impacts of
climate change, the government has maintained its efforts for the last eight
years, supporting rice farmers by offering agricultural subsidies to rice
farmers by covering 75 per cent of the cost of agro-inputs. Farmers get
the inputs at subsidized prices for example Hansunil herbicide from China at
Tshs.6,000 ($2.6) instead of Ths. 26,000 ($11.3) per liter and fertilizers at
Tshs.10,000 ($4.4) for the 50-kilogram bag instead of Tshs. 60,000 ($26).
In addition a total of 600 farmers received training on good
farming practices through Expanding Rice Production Process (ERPP). These
cumulative efforts have substantially increased the rice yields from 39,000
tonnes in 2017 to 48,118 tonnes in 2018, equivalent to an increase of 23 per
cent. Likewise, last year also saw a noticeable increase in the availability of
various fruits and vegetables, particularly tomatoes.
On 13th December 2018, the Ministry of
Agriculture, Natural Resources, Livestock and Fisheries, on behalf of the
government , signed an agreement with a contractor from the Republic of Korea
for the construction of irrigation infrastructure that will cover a total of
1524 hectares. The irrigation infrastructure covers rice farms in Cheju,
Bumbwisudi and Kibokwa villages in Unguja Island while in Pemba the farms are
at Makwararani and Chamanangwe villages.
The Zanzibar President stated that the government in collaboration
with other development partners designed a special 10 year agricultural program
under the name of The Zanzibar Agricultural Sector Development Program (ZASDP)
already in progress and to be implemented in three phases, two of which will be
of three years and the other of four years.
Despite weather challenges which include variability in
rainfall, studies have indicated that Zanzibar can still increase rice and
other farm products through irrigation. The Zanzibaris are encouraged to
utilize the opportunities citing the development partners who have extended a
supporting hand. Training of more Field Extension Officers (FEO), having enough
farming tractors, and other important farm equipment, are other ongoing plans
to ensure farmers double production. Zanzibar has about 8,521 hectares of land
suitable for rice irrigation farming and is targeting to produce at least 50
percent of the required rice by 2020.
In Zanzibar farmers grow different kinds of rice which include
New Rice for Africa (NERICA) an interspecific cultivar of rice developed by the
Africa Rice Center (AfricaRice) to improve the yield of African rice varieties.
It is said that NERICA rice (takes 80-90 days) is a cross
between varieties of high-yielding Asian rice and the robust and disease-resistant
African rice, developed at WARDA -the West African Rice Development Agency- a
rice research centre. Other types of rice grown include; Super-India which
takes four months, BKN-Supa (90 days), TxD 306 and TxD 88 which both take 120
days. According to the Africa Agriculture Status Report (AASR) 2018, countries
in the continent are required to do more to improve agriculture, and that the
African Union (AU) sponsors a large, highly professional, continuing
development of an Africa-wide blueprint for accelerated agricultural growth—
the Comprehensive African Agricultural Development Program (CAADP). It says
that the Heads of State of all African countries have signed off on it and it
has formed the basis for agricultural growth strategies in those countries.
CAADP quantified national targets of six percent agricultural
growth rate; 10 percent of national budgets to agriculture, and one percent of
agricultural GDP to agricultural research, yet few African countries have come
even close to meeting these targets. The reports said “They are expected to be
the national targets as more and more African countries commit to accelerated
agricultural growth,” as it mentions Ethiopia, as a major success in
agricultural growth with 25 years of exceeding the CAADP target of a six
percent growth rate, with consequent halving of rural poverty, carefully
patterned its strategy and plan on the CAADP model. Ghana and Rwanda are other
countries on track with improving productivity. AASR says Political will (that
the politicians want to) is the prerequisite to implementation to achieve
national objectives.
Description of a “lack of political will” has been prominent in
the analyses of poor agricultural performance in African countries.
Truant weather dampens rabi sowing
Our Bureau New Delhi | Updated
on February 15, 2019 Published onFebruary 15, 2019
Wheat area at
last year’s levels, but quality may take a hit
Moderate and heavy rainfall
together with hailstorm experienced in some regions of North India this week
left wheat and other crops partly damaged even as the rabi planting data
released by the Agriculture Ministry indicated a shortfall of four per cent in
area as compared to the corresponding week last year.
As against 643.6 lakh hectares
(lh) planted in the same week previous year, the area covered during the
current rabi season stood at 617.8 lh, the Agriculture Ministry data showed on
Friday.
Rain affects
wheat
Thanks to a late-surge in sowing
in Madhya Pradesh, wheat closed the gap to less than 1 per cent as compared to
the previous rabi season with the total area planted inching more than 298 lh.
However, the quality of the crop
may have taken a hit with many parts of the key growing States of Punjab,
Haryana and Uttar Pradesh witnessing moderate to heavy rainfall early this
week, which is detrimental to the standing crop.
According to official release
from Punjab government, the State experienced widespread moderate to heavy
rainfall along with storm and some districts such as Fatehgarh Sahib,
Hoshiyarpur, Kapurthala, Ludhiana, Patiala, Ropar and Ferozpur reported light
hailstorm that damaged some area of wheat, sarson, vegetables and rabi fodder
in these districts.
Drought
situation
Similarly, Bihar government
issued a notification this week that 23 districts in the State — as many as 275
blocks — were affected by drought which will reduce the crop area in the State.
Nearly 10 per cent drop in gram
cultivation, reported mainly from Maharashtra, which is hit by a major drought,
has affected the overall pulses cultivation, which came to 156.3 lh, nearly six
per cent lower than 166 lh in the corresponding week last year.
Winter rice, on the other hand,
was down by 14 per cent mainly because of the subdued planting in the States of
Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Telangana.
Rice, cereals
lose
The area covered under winter
rice till this week was less than 34 lh as compared to 39.64 lh in the same
week last year.
Similarly, the cultivation of
coarse cereals, too, is equally hit with two major nutri-cereals growing States
— Maharashtra and Karnataka — reeling under drought. Acreage under coarse
cereals stands at 48.69 lh (57 lh).
Apart from wheat, oilseeds is the
only crop which managed to retain last year’s level. A surge in
mustard/rapeseed cultivation in Rajasthan has been critical in taking the total
oilseeds sowing area to about 80 lh, which was slightly lower than that in
2017-18.
Govt. to regulate rice prices from April 1
18 February 2019 02:58 am - 2 - 888
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Agriculture Minister P. Harrison said that the
maximum retail price (MRP)of a kilogramme of Samba would be Rs.85 while Nadu
would have an MRP of Rs. 80 with effect from April 1 this year. He said this at
a meeting held with the representatives of farmer organisations in Nachchaduwa,
Anuradhapura yesterday (17).The Minister said, “We are making arrangements to
purchase paddy from the farmers at a guaranteed price. Likewise, we have to
take care of consumers and make sure that they are able to purchase stocks of
rice, especially for the upcoming Hindu and Sinhala New Year at reasonable
prices. There has always been a problem in reconciling these two aspects.
The people complain that rice prices have
increased exorbitantly in the market although a kilo of Nadu is purchased from
the farmers at Rs.38 and Samba at Rs. 41 and that they had to pay double this
amount for their rice. Once the maximum retail price for rice comes into
operation the issues faced by both parties would automatically be solved”,
Harrison explained.(Athula Bandara)
NFA told to submit restructuring
plan as open rice trade starts on March 3
A
council headed by Cabinet officials asked state-run National Food Authority to
submit a restructuring plan within 30 days as the open rice trade is set to
start on March 3.
Finance
Secretary Carlos Dominguez III headed the NFA Council meeting Monday following
the signing of Republic Act No. 11203 or the Rice Tariffication Act by
President Roderigo Duterte on Feb. 15. The new law that amended RA 8178
lifted the quantitative restrictions on rice and replaced it with 40-percent
tariff.
The
NFA Council also instructed the NFA to submit a restructuring plan within 30
days, instead of the initial proposal of 180 days.
Dominguez
presided over the meeting as endorsed by Agriculture Secretary and NFA Council
chairman Emmanuel Piñol, who was unavailable during the meeting.
“Our
objective in liberalizing rice imports is to bring down the costs of the
staple. Our price is 50-percent higher than the others, including Singapore
which does not produce rice. Will it take us 180 days to effect a reduction in
the cost of living our the people?” said Dominguez during the meeting.
Dominguez
proposed during the meeting that the National Economic and Development
Authority determine what funds could be freed up as a result of the
restructuring of the agency to ensure that farmers would receive the support
they needed.
The
Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund mandated under the rice tariffication law
is still in the process of being set up.
The
meeting was called to immediately discuss the implementing rules and
regulations of RA 11203.
Trade
Secretary Ramon Lopez proposed that the shift to a tariffied regime as mandated
under the law be done as soon as possible.
Lopez
said the reorganization of the NFA could be done separately from the move to
shift from quantitative restrictions to tariffs which should be implemented
faster.
The
council also approved the transfer of the NFA functions to the Department of
Agriculture as provided under the rice tariffication law, effective March
3.
Dominguez
said the transfer of the Food Development Center from the NFA to the DA could
also be done in a short time instead of the NFA proposal of 60 days.
Other
officials who attended the meeting were Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Deputy
Governor Diwa Guinigundo, Agriculture Undersecretary Ariel Cayanan, Finance
Undersecretary Karl Kendrick Chua, National Treasurer Rosalia de Leon, Monetary
Board member Bruce Tolentino and representatives from the NFA, Neda, Land Bank
of the Philippines, DA, Department of Trade and Industry and Department of
Social Welfare and Development.
NFA-Bohol workers
wear black to mourn ‘death of the rice industry’
By: Leo Udtohan - Correspondent / @leoudtohanINQ
Inquirer Visayas / 05:07 PM February 18, 2019
National Food Authority-Bohol manager Maria
Fe Evasco reads the message of NFA acting administrator Tomas Escarez on the
effect of the Rice Tariffication Act. ( Photo courtesy of MARIA FE EVASCO / NFA
Bohol)
TAGBILARAN
CITY, Bohol — At least 30 employees of the National Food Authority (NFA)-Bohol
wore something black on Monday to protest a new law that removes import limits
on rice and strips off the agency’s regulatory powers.
During the
agency’s flag raising ceremony, NFA-Bohol manager Maria Fe Evasco read the
message of NFA acting administrator Tomas Escarez on the effect of the rice
tariffication law.
She said
Monday was a “day of mourning for the death of the rice industry in the
Philippines.”
“It’s the
beginning of the end of the rice industry in the Philippines,” Evasco said.
“This law stripped the NFA of its regulatory and stabilization functions. We
are just reduced to a mere buffer stocking agency.”
Evasco said
the law would affect many farmers, small grains retailers, and consumers who
rely on NFA for support, livelihood, affordable rice, food safety, food
security, and order in the grains industry.
“The law
allows anyone to import rice at any volume as long as they pay the 35 percent
tariff. There is no longer a limit on rice importation which will definitely
hurt our palay farmers,” Evasco said. “There will be no price monitoring and
control as NFA rice will no longer be available through accredited retailers.”
She stressed
that the law was “anti-rice stakeholders, anti-farmers, and anti-consumers.”
Evasco,
however, said that the possible effects of the newly-signed rice tariffication
law among farmers in the province would not be felt immediately.
Bohol,
considered as the rice bowl in Central Visayas, was expecting harvest season in
March when Boholano consumers would buy newly-harvested palay — that is,
unhusked rice — at P22 pesos per kilo and commercial rice.
Evasco said
the government’s subsidized rice of 32,000 sacks arrived in Bohol two weeks
ago. Some bags would be kept for emergencies.
“We will no
longer sell the P27 per kilo NFA rice once our inventories will be depleted by
August this year,” Evasco said.
Consumers
then will have to buy expensive commercial rice, she said.
NFA procures
palay from local farmers at a support price of P17 per kilo with additional
incentives to include P3 per kilo in buffer stocking incentive, 20 centavos per
kg in drying fee, 20 centavos per kg in delivery fee, and 30 centavos per kg in
Cooperative Development Incentive Fee or a total of P17.70 per kg (clean and
dry).
In a
statement, the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) said President Rodrigo
Duterte’s signature on the reviled Rice Tariffication Act would pave the way
for unbridled rice importation and increasing rice prices would be equivalent
to a death sentence for the local rice industry and rice farmers.
The law will
directly affect 13.5 million palay farmers and their families, 17.5 million
farm workers, and more than 10 million Filipinos dependent on NFA rice, 20,000
rice retailers and 55,000 rice mill workers.
“It’s the
beginning of the end of the local rice industry. Even with the rice industry
enhancement fund, the local rice industry does not stand a chance with massive
rice imports,” Danilo Ramos, KMP chairperson, said in a statement.
“Rice
tariffication will only push the country to unprecedented hunger. Our decades
of experience under the World Trade Organization proved that rice importation
policy was never a guarantee of sufficient rice supply and lower rice prices,”
Ramos added.
“Duterte has
no hint of compassion towards Filipino farmers and the poor people with his
string of anti-people policies. Last year he enacted the TRAIN Law, today, he
signed the rice tariffication despite the strong calls for a veto of the bill,”
Ramos added. /atm
Australia CRC goes wild for native rice
On NT Country Hour with Matt
Brann
The CRC for Developing
Northern Australia has launched a $505,000 project aimed at
kick-starting a rice industry in the north, with the potential, it says, to
produce more than 1 million tonnes of specialty rice each year.
The 18-month research project
will evaluate three different northern rice industry scenarios, including
examining the production of wild rice, the production of a unique northern
Australian rice variety and the potential for commercial use of genes from
Australian wild rice to support the breeding of rice for global production.
Dr Sean Bellairs from Charles
Darwin University, spoke to ABC Rural about the project and the potential he
sees for rice in the north.
Mekong Delta enjoys good start
to rice harvest #AsiaNewsNetwork
Harvesting the
winter – spring rice crop in Kien Giang Province’s Chau Thanh District. –
VNA/VNS Photo Le Sen
PUBLISHED 16 FEBRUARY 2019
(Viet Nam News/ANN) - Farmers
in the Mekong Delta have begun harvesting the winter–spring rice crop in areas
where it was sowed early, and yields are high.
Nguyen Van Phuc of Dong Thap
Province’s Thap Muoi District said he planted IR 50404 rice this time and got a
yield of seven tonnes per hectare, higher than last year.
Besides, costs were lower than
previous years because rice fields had plenty of sediments deposited meaning
farmers could use less fertilisers, he said.
Authorities had released
floodwaters rich with sediments from the rising Mekong River into nearly half
of the province’s rice farming areas between August and October last year.
Besides depositing the sediments, this also helped destroy disease-causing
pests.
More than 197,000ha were planted in
the province, 60 per cent of them with high-quality rice varieties, according
to its Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
Farmers have harvested more than
50,000ha so far with an average yield of 6.5 tonnes per hectare.
Nguyen Van Cong, director of the
department, said the province is focusing on the quality of its agricultural
produce this year.
In Can Tho, more than 1,120ha out
of the 81,264ha of winter – spring rice crop have been harvested with an
average yield of seven tonnes, according to the city Department of Agriculture
and Rural Development.
Rice companies guarantee purchase
of more than 15,000ha of rice, down 5,000ha from a year ago.
The price of paddy around the delta
has fallen since last year.
Farmers are having difficulty
selling their harvest since rice companies face a cash crunch.
On Wednesday, the Can Tho City
People’s Committee held a meeting with rice companies and banks to find a way
to buy paddy from farmers.
Truong Quang Hoai Nam, deputy
director of the city People’s Committee, instructed relevant agencies to help
rice companies obtain loans for buying rice from farmers.
The city would ask the Government
to instruct banks to increase credit to rice companies, he said.
It expects about 570,000 tonnes of
paddy to be harvested, with the harvest peaking by the end of this month.
In the winter-spring crop the delta
plants rice in around 1.6 million hectares and expects to harvest 11 million
tonnes of paddy.
Pest threat
In Kien Giang Province, the delta’s
largest rice producer, authorities have warned rice farmers about the threat of
brown plant hoppers to this crop.
Around 26,700ha have been affected
by rice pests, mostly brown plant hoppers, according to the province’s Plant
Cultivation and Protection Sub-department
Do Minh Nhut, deputy director of
the Kiên Giang Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, said the
department has instructed relevant agencies to help prevent rice pests and
instruct farmers to regularly inspect their fields to prevent disease
outbreaks.
It planted 289,112ha of rice in the
winter-spring crop, marginally higher than its target.
Farmers have harvested more than
22,500ha so far.
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