Rice inventory declines in November

MANILA, Philippines — The country’s rice inventory decreased for the first time this year, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said.

Latest data from the PSA showed that total rice inventory stood at 2.96 million metric tons, 1.3 percent lower than the three million MT recorded last year.

The current inventory, however, is 30 percent higher than the previous month’s 2.28 million MT.

Based on the average daily consumption of Filipinos of 32,000 MT, the current inventory is sufficient for 93 days.

Households had more than half of total inventories, accounting for 52 percent while commercial warehouses held about 33 percent. Supplies from the National Food Authority depositories cornered 15 percent of the total.

On a monthly basis, rice stocks in households and commercial warehouses jumped by 45 percent and 18 percent, respectively. A 15 percent increase was also noted in NFA depositories.

Prices of Filipinos’ main staple continued to be on the downward trend for nine months now, with consumers saving more and farmers earning less following the influx of imported rice after the government opened the rice industry to more private sector imports.

PSA said the average wholesale price of well-milled rice is now at P37.33 per kilogram as of the third week of November.

This is 13 percent lower than the P42.64 per kilo recorded a year ago and 0.2 percent below on a weekly basis.  The average retail price also decreased by 10.7 percent to P41.53 per kilo.

Meanwhile, the wholesale price of regular-milled rice was P33.22 per kilo, down 16 percent while the average retail price was P36.70 per kilo.

While consumers are benefitting from the opening up of the market, local farmers are suffering from declining palay farm gate prices.

The average farm gate price of palay is nowhere near recovery at P15.52 per kilo, just 0.5 percent better on a weekly basis.

The current price represents a 22.6 percent drop from the P20.04 per kilo last year.

The lower farm gate price was due to the increased local harvest, exacerbated by imports flooding the commercial market.