Henry Sy eyes NFA property in Nueva Ecija as site of new SM mall complex

CABANATUAN CITY – Shopping mogul Henry Sy of the SM Group of Companies is looking at the sprawling compound of the National Food Authority (NFA) here as the site of another giant SM mall.

NFA Administrator and former Nueva Ecija Gov. Eduardo Nonato Joson said Sy is eyeing either a joint venture agreement or a lease agreement with the agency to develop the NFA compound along the Maharlika Highway here into what will be called SM-Cabanatuan.

He said the NFA has 12 to 15 hectares of lot available for the planned complex.

Joson said this development is not a part of the privatization plan of the Estrada administration as feared by NFA Central Luzon employees.

As early as two months ago, regional and provincial employees of the NFA have been asking questions about Sy’s offer. The issue was even reportedly raised during a meeting of regional presidents of the NFA Employees’ Association (NFAEA) in Cebu, but no explanation was made.

A few weeks back, a communication from the NFA central office in Quezon City supposedly instructed the NFA regional office to submit the estimated cost of properties in Cabanatuan, specifically the cost entailed by the possible pullout of the agency’s facilities in the compound.

Joson said the plan will not be carried out immediately since an evaluation is being conducted after which the agency will submit a recommendation to the NFA Council chaired by Agriculture Secretary Edgardo Angara.

He said the agency is studying whether to enter into a joint venture agreement with Sy or just lease the property. But he admitted that he is personally in favor of a lease agreement which he described as ‘more simple and workable.’

‘In a lease agreement, the NFA earns money while at the same time no property is lost,’ he said. ‘It’s really up to the NFA what to do with the property.’

Joson explained that the NFA regional and provincial offices located in the compound will stay. It is the 12 warehouses which will be relocated, he said, and will be farmed out in the various towns and cities in the province.

‘Under the current physical set-up, the operations of the regional NFA are too centralized. That is why we deem it proper to move the warehouses so that they may be established in the barangays. That way, too, the NFA will truly become a service corporation,’ he said.

Last March, President Estrada approved the proposal to privatize the NFA as part of the terms and conditions for the approval by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) of a $175-million agricultural loan sought by government.

But the privatization plan was reportedly put on hold by the President over protest from the NFAEA and the grains industry players.