NFA Council OKs rice imports to boost buffer stock


Cabinet Secretary Leoncio Evasco Jr. on Tuesday said the National Food Authority (NFA) Council has ordered signing of the remaining import permits to reinforce the government's buffer stock.
Evasco confirmed to reporters in an interview in Malacañang that the NFA’s buffer stock can only last up to eight days more.
“Totoo iyan. That’s why the Council instructed the NFA management to sign the remaining import permits for all these rice to come in and to facilitate the incoming rice to get into our markets and to intensify buying. So, while waiting for these rice to come through the G2P mode of procurement, we will have convenient and comfortable supply of rice,” he said.
Evasco said the Council also told the NFA management was to purchase more from local farmers.
“Second resolution is for NFA to intensify buying local produce from our farmers if only to maintain a good buffer stock while awaiting the coming of more stocks from the importation of rice,” he said.
He said NFA Administrator Jason Aquino was present during the Council’s meeting on Monday.
No rice shortage
He also assured the public that there was no rice shortage in the country and the prices in the market would not spike. 
“Wala naman… Some of the imported rice are still coming in and thirdly we are still towards the last lap of the harvest season,” he said.
Evasco said the Legislative Executive Development Advisory Council (LEDAC) required the NFA to maintain a rice buffer stock that would last for 15 days at any given time and 30 days at the onset of the lean months of July to September.
He said the daily consumption rate was 32,720 metric tons of 654,600 bags. —ALG, GMA News

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Russia captures town after 2 years of Ukrainian resistance --- Reuters

Russian forces now control 98.5% of Luhansk, 60% of Donetsk MOSCOW: Russian troops on Wednesday took charge of the eastern Ukrainian town of Vuhledar, a bastion that had resisted intense attacks since Russia launched its full-scale assault in 2022. The advance of Moscow's forces, which control just under a fifth of Ukraine, has underlined Russia's vast superiority in men and materiel as Ukraine pleads for more weapons from the Western allies that have been supporting it. Ukraine's eastern military command said it had ordered a pullback from the hilltop coal mining town to avoid encirclement by Russian troops and "preserve personnel and military equipment". The Russian defense ministry did not mention Vuhledar in its daily battlefield report. Russian Telegram channels, however, published video of troops waving the Russian tricolor flag over shattered buildings. The town, which had a population of over 14,000 before the war, has been devastated, with Soviet-era
Read more

UP Diliman Professors Share Scientists’ Procurement Struggles at Senate Hearing

By Harvey Sapigao Senate hearing of the revised procurement law (Photo credit: Senate of the Philippines) College of Science (CS) Dean Giovanni Tapang held up a little white device as he finished his presentation. “This is a ₱150,000 component,” he described. “Isa lang gumagawa nito sa buong mundo, pero ang hirap pilitin sila na magregister sa PhilGEPS,” he continued, referring to the requirement that foreign companies must first register to the Philippine Government Electronic Procurement System (PhilGEPS) before they can sell products to local scientists. Marine Science Institute (MSI) Deputy Director Dr. Irene Rodriguez explained that the small device is a resin that filters metals in water. “May budget tayo,” she said, “pero ang problema ko ay ‘yung resin na ito.” This and other bottlenecks brought about by the procurement law, or the Government Procurement Reform Act (RA 9184), slow down research and development in the country. UPD leaders were invited to the Senate he
Read more

Vietnam condemns China's 'brutal behavior' in fisher attack ---- Agence France-Presse

HANOI, Vietnam — Vietnam's foreign ministry condemned on Wednesday China's "brutal behavior" during a violent attack on Vietnamese fishers in the disputed South China Sea. The 10 fishermen were reportedly beaten with iron bars and robbed of thousands of dollars' worth of fish and equipment on Sunday off the Paracel Islands -- an archipelago in the resource-rich waterway claimed by China, Vietnam, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia and Brunei. Vietnam "resolutely protests the brutal behavior of Chinese law enforcement forces against Vietnamese fishermen and fishing vessels operating in the Hoang Sa archipelago of Vietnam", foreign ministry spokesperson Vietnam Pham Thu Hang said in a statement, using the Vietnamese term for the Paracel Islands. "The above actions of Chinese law enforcement forces seriously violated Vietnam's sovereignty" over the archipelago, the statement said. Four of the Vietnamese crew were taken to hospital on Monday
Read more