DTI: P500 price guide meant to be 'advocacy' to show goods still 'in reach'
MANILA, Philippines — The Department of Trade and Industry on Monday defended its so-called price guide on social media saying that a family of four to five could spend less than P500 for its Noche Buena meal.
The department found itself at the receiving end of social media backlash after it posted a price guide that said consumers could lean on bundled goods and discounted products instead to meet their budget. The post has since been taken down as of this writing.
In a phone call with Philstar.com, DTI Assistant Secretary Ann Cabochan asserted that the infographics were meant to be an advocacy, not an imposition on consumers or recommendation on what to buy.
"It is not a recommendation. Those social cards that were uploaded on our social media accounts were just our advocacy campaign. We were actually just telling consumers that if you use the Noche Buena price guide, that you can come out with different configurations of what you may want to prepare for Noche Buena," she said.
"We just wanted to show to consumers that even with rising prices and the complaints that everything is going up that there are some Noche Buena products, the more popular ones that we usually use in the ordinary household that are still in reach."
According to the price guide, shoppers can buy spaghetti, pan de sal, salad, pork, ham and cheese all for less than P500 as long as they go with the cheapest brands and options.
Will the DTI revise its price guide after taking it down?
"There's no intention to revise it. Those social cards were circulated, were uploaded because we wanted to give consumers an idea that they can use the price guide to make a decision on what to buy," Cabochan said.
'Out of touch' with reality on the ground
Users on social media called out the infographic for being out of touch with the skyrocketing prices of basic goods on the ground.
According to the Philippine Statistics Authority, the headline inflation rate for October was at 7.7% — good for the fastest acceleration of inflation rates in over a decade.
In filing House Resolution 612, Rep. Patrick Michael Vargas (Quezon City) earlier called on manufacturers and sellers to observe the recommended price ceiling for basic commodities “for the benefit of the Filipino people during the holidays amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.”
“Two years have passed since the COVID-19 public health crisis began and the country is only beginning to slowly recover from its economic losses... as new fiscal and economic reforms and policies are being rolled out by the current administration,” he said.
Citing data from the DTI, the resolution pointed out that some 195 out of the 223 usual noche buena products have already raised prices, with nearly half raising prices by more than 10%.
DTI Undersecretary Ruth Castelo echoed this call over the Laging Handa briefing.
"We have a standing appeal to the manufacturers that if it is possible, because we understand that the cost of production is really high these days, but our appeal to them is that if they will increase, it's only the absolute minimum so they won't go bankrupt. We don't want those who manufacture these goods to go bankrupt, but it also can't be that heavy for the consumers," she said in mixed Filipino and English.
"You can see in our Noche Buena price guide that was released, there are the lowest variants, these are the cheapest. The others there are quite high-end, but there are always the lower variants that they choose."
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