OZAMIZ CITY: While the reported rice crisis has sent discomfort to every Filipino, such a sticky situation is too good to be true for city councilors to believe it may not be happening at all.
Even archbishop Jesus Dosado has uttered his opinion on the rice problem, saying this could be a stunt staged to cover up the greater issue of corruption happening in Manila now.
Dosado, who seldom voices his views on national issues, aired his commentary in an interview by DxDD: "I believe the rice crisis is a political issue and I don't want to give any political comment because it would be really dangerous for the Filipino to switch them from the real issue of corruption."
"Even as the rice crisis provides some temporary relief for President Arroyo from the scandals, traders may also be hoarding rice, to sabotage our economy," he added.
The Archdiocesan Social Action Center has been helping NFA/church-accredited outlets distribute 100 sacks a week. Such arrangements, it is hoped, should end speculations and possible hoarding in the city.
Like Dosado, who sees no rice shortage in the province, councilor Taryn Mecaros shares the view but tried to become ludicrous when he asked Mila Tanguamos of the National Food Authority (NFA) how true all this is.
Tanguamos represented NFA head Avelino Orseno last week when the city council called on the said office to shed light on the rice issue affecting the province.
Tanguamos assured councilors on the situation of NFA rice, in terms of demand and supply in Ozamiz, saying: “We would like to assure this honorable body, in terms supply, we have enough rice supply.”
“Our present rice price is P18.25 only ug ang mga tawo dinhi gyod mopalit kay layo ra man kung itandi sa commercial rice,”
With regards to their inventory, Tanguamos disclosed that for this month, NFA has retained imported stocks from Cagayan de Oro City and can even supply the province for the whole year.
“Kanunay’ng gina-replenish ang atong stocks. We still have some 30,000 bags to compliment our 25,000 in the warehouse at present. So far, Misamis Occidental has enough stocks, more than enough,” she said.
Mecaros then asked if the rice crisis would likely be felt in the province, Tanguamos answered that like the others, what we have now is rice price increase.
The rice price increase, Tanguamos could partly be due to the increase in the support price of buying price with NFA, from P11 to P17.
“As a rule of the thumb, we have this additional incentive of P6 per kilo. Naa gyod na kanunay, dayon ang pagbaligya ana mo-increase na. This buying price is good for April and May,” she added.
If rice supply is abundant, why pull out rice from the retailers and have it only available in NFA outlets, Mecaros then asked, to which Tanguamos said that it is just a matter of policy.
Malou Mangahas, in an article entitled “The imminent crisis in rice,” said as the country produces about nearly 100 percent of the rice it needs, it imported up to 2.1 million metric tons to be able to maintain its two-month inventory. But since January, the inventory has drop down by 20 percent.
In 2006, every Filipino consumed 118.7 kilos or 2.4 sacks of rice a year, Mangahas averred.
“The alarm bells have been sounded: The world’s rice stocks have dipped to their lowest level in 25 years. The most rosy estimates say the global rice supply could slide to 70 million tons, less than half the 150 million-ton inventory in the year 2000,” she said.
“Various reasons have been blamed for the sharp slide in supply: erratic weather; natural disasters; soaring fuel and transport costs; supply hoarding and smuggling; conversion of agricultural lands to cash crops, biofuel production, and other commercial purposes, etcetera.”
“But from country to country feeding on the staple grain, the context remains the same: galloping population growth rate has unduly stepped up the demand for rice, even as production has remained low or stagnant,” added Mangahas.
A supply crisis was seen and the world’s major rice producers like China and Thailand have decided to ban or restrict exports or reduce volumes of imports to other countries like what Vietnam, India, Egypt did.
“Just three months gone in 2008, the figures seem alarming indeed. The global rice demand is estimated at 423 million tons, or more than the current season’s record harvest of 420 million tons, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture,”
“It must be stressed that only seven percent of the world’s total rice production is exported abroad, and the bulk consumed by the teeming populations of rice-producing nations. Asia’s 2.5-billion people mostly depend on the cheap rice for sustenance.”
A year ago, Mangahas notes the country imported some 1.8 million tons of rice. For 2008, it hopes to buy at least 1.6 million tons, on top of a record production target of 17.33 million tons to raise self-sufficiency to 92 percent.
To avoid wasting extra rice, various saving tips have been offered like turning it into fried rice, rice salad, rice soup, rice cake or pudding, rice caserole, rice pasta, rice crispies, or rice porridge.
Debora MacKenzie, in an article she wrote for NewScientist entitled “World food price crisis blamed on government neglect,” said that “the worldwide surge in food prices is a predictable result of the neglect of agricultural research over the past two decades.”
This neglect, according to MacKenzie’s interview with Bob Zeigler, head of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Los Baños, is already anticipated.
"We don't see this as a surprise," Zeigler said. "We've seen this coming for years. Basically, we're victims of our own success."
“World food prices have been rising since 2000, but this sped up slightly in 2007, then sharply in early 2008. High prices have hit the urban poor especially hard, and led to food shortages, riots and demonstrations worldwide,” the article continued.
"That is just too low to meet increasing demand," says Zeigler. "That's why we're eating more than we're producing."
Meanwhile, Fr. Lanie Serino, assistant school superintendent of the Archdiocesan Commission on Education, seconded Dosado’s observation and pointed to government official’s misconduct and the selfish interest of rice traders.
Serino disproved a statement from a congressman who earlier said that the rice crisis was due to the growing population and the obstinate pressure from the Catholic Church on government’s population management and family planning programs.
To blame the current crisis to population explosion is pathetic, adds Serino, since “corrupt government officials have been a burden to the Filipino people and has made a crisis out of everything.”
Aside from it, the priest said that foreign debts, inefficient land distribution, under utilization of existing agricultural lands, smuggling, graft and corruption and misappropriation of government funds are also to blame for the current crisis.
To blame the population explosion is pathetic, adds Serino as the government appropriated P5.3 billion for family planning to purchase contraceptives, including condoms, pills and sterilization programs.
MICHAEL MEDINA