How to solve the country’s rice problem?

We can’t deny that presently there is so much that is going wrong in the Philippines. If asked to list down the positive things happening in the country one would be hard-pressed to think of anything truly substantial. What is more prevalent are the bad things, the continuous increase in the price of fuel, the crime rate climbing, the election circus getting crazier by the day, and in general rising prices of almost all basic commodities.

There are those who attribute the current inflation problem to the increasing global price of oil. And while that may have an impact, another big reason people believe that the cost of prices are going crazy right now is the country’s lack of rice coupled with the devastation brought about by monsoons and storms on vegetables and other crops. However, rice does remain at the crux of the problem. This most basic food staple has been sorely lacking causing several price increases and making it hard for citizens to afford the Filipino food staple for their families.

It’s actually such a sad situation and I’ve touched on it before in previous columns because I think the writing has been on the wall for a long time and no one has taken notice until it was too late. We needed to invest in our agriculture sector for a long time and I feel that we just continued to let it get past a point of no return. Now we are struggling when we could have planned better a long time ago.

Honestly, when you look back we used to be one of the leading producers of rice in the world. Other countries in Southeast Asia would come to the Philippines to learn about rice and the methods we used. We were a shining example to our Asian neighbors back then. But sadly it didn’t last and today we are forced to import rice in the hopes of driving prices down and alleviating the scarcity. Obviously something went really wrong somewhere along the way and I think it’s important the government try to address the real problem instead of just thinking of short-term solutions.

Currently what the Department of Agriculture (DA) is looking at now is allowing retailers to directly import rice. This would be a first and the government hopes that effectively removing “middle men” will help retailers get rice that they can sell at a lower cost in the local markets. Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol said that allowing grain retailers to participate in the import market would make sales more direct and help bring down the prices.

This makes sense but with so much dependence on imported rice – how will this affect local agriculture and the price of locally produced grains? Piñol said he was confident that this would not have a negative impact on locally produced rice because the President has a big directive on the amount of rice buffer he would like to have available in the Philippines. He wants to avoid another shortage and in order to do that he wants to have more than an adequate amount available at any given time.

Because of this Piñol shared that the government would still buy locally produced rice to meet the buffer amount set forth by the President. He believes that it will take a combined effort of imported rice and locally produced rice to meet the high demand. In the end it looks like the current solution to the rice crisis is to import more rice and stockpile more locally produced grain at the same time.

Is this tactic going to work? In the short run we will probably see more rice availability and perhaps if grain retailers import on their own the prices will go down. However, is this a long-term solution? Hard to say. I still think it is important for the government to study our current agriculture sector and systems and find a way to beef up locally produced rice in efforts to make the country more self-sufficient.

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And from rice we shift to fuel – the two things that are causing mayhem in the country and pushing up the cost of living. This November commuters will be facing a fare hike as the transport regulators provisionally approved petitions for fare adjustments due to the high price of fuel. Prices are looking to go up roughly P1 for jeepney and bus fares.

Naturally this is going to add yet another layer of difficulty for our citizens who are all struggling to get by in the current situation where the prices of just about everything have increased – from gas to food to even basic services and commodities. However, as difficult as a fare hike is going to be, we also can’t blame the jeepneys and buses because the cost of doing their business has increased exponentially too.

It just seems like, once again, the brunt of the higher cost of doing business has to be borne by the people. Because while all of the prices around Filipinos are increasing, salaries continue to remain the same. How can one be expected to afford the basics these days when everything costs two to three times more but their pay has not increased? The very little additional take home promised by TRAIN doesn’t even come close to covering the additional expenses.

It has been an issue of contention that because transportation expenses will be higher then basic wages should increase as well. This is a topic set to be discussed with the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board. Hopefully they are able to come to a fair and workable agreement. At this point many Filipinos can barely even afford to make ends meet and come November even getting to work is going to cost more.