Philippines to spend P8 bilion for rice imports

MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines is spending P8 billion to purchase an additional 300,000 metric tons of rice via the government-to-government scheme to boost the inventory of the country’s main staple.

In a virtual briefing Monday, Department of Agriculture Secretary William Dar said the idea proposed by the DA and the National Food Authority has been approved by the Inter-agency Task Force on the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases.

“The budget will be given to the DTI (Department of Trade and Industry) and PITC (Philippine International Trading Corp.). They will be the ones to do the G2G arrangement,” Dar said.

“The role of the DA is on technical advice with PITC. The group already had a meeting last week,” he said.

Trade Secretary Ramon Lopez, on the other hand, said the budget for the rice imports is around P8 billion.

Dar said the DTI and PITC are now leading the G2G discussion with potential exporters.

“Even India is offering (to supply). Myanmar is also wide open, they have enough supplies to export that’s why there is no need to panic,” he said.

This after Vietnam, the country’s biggest rice supplier, decided to temporarily decrease its rice exports.

Even with the Rice Tariffication Law already in place, President Duterte could still direct the PITC and DTI to import.

Further, Dar said Vietnam has committed to resume selling and exporting to the private sector in the Philippines.

“Vietnam already said they would export this month 400,000 MT,” Dar said.

Vietnam is currently facing prolonged drought and saline intrusion which has greatly affected its rice production and food security. The country is reviewing its rice production and domestic supply situation to make appropriate rice export management plans.

Since January, about 600,000 MT of rice have already arrived in the country.

However, there are still some 1.3 million MT of rice that have already been issued import clearances by the DA.

Dar maintained the country’s rice inventory is good until June and the ongoing harvest would help further beef up stocks.