Monday, April 14, 2008 NFA penalizes 23 violators in S. Cotabato
KORONADAL CITY -- The National Food Authority (NFA) in South Cotabato has discovered and penalized 23 accredited rice dealers for violating the grains agency's trade guidelines, an official said.
Pangalian B. Busaran, NFA-South Cotabato provincial director, said they have punished the unscrupulous accredited rice retailers after monitoring teams discovered that they have been passing rice allocations to other rice traders not accredited by the grains agency.
Another common violation was the delay in the display of NFA rice in accredited outlets as markets open for the day, he added.
"We meted them penalties ranging from suspension to a cut in rice allocation," Busaran told reporters in a press conference here, assuring enough rice supply for the province's 10 towns and this city.
The erring NFA-accredited rice retailers came from the towns of Norala and Banga and in this capital city, he added.
There are at least 183 accredited rice retailers, 125 "Tindahan Natin" outlets and three Bigasan ni Gloria sa Palengke stores serviced by the provincial grains office.
Despite assuring enough rice supply, he said the provincial NFA office, however, has limited rice allocation to five sacks per week to accredited retailers, apparently to avoid hoarding, starting last March Fruto Sumagaysay, a rice retailer at the public market here.
He lamented that previously an accredited rice retailer can get 50 sacks of rice from the local NFA office a week.
"If the government can infuse such volume of rice again, it can contain the soaring price of ordinary rice," Sumagaysay said, adding that flooding the markets with NFA rice will also pull down the price of ordinary commercial rice, such as the M-1 variety, as the mass consumers would prefer the P18.25 a kilo NFA rice thus prompting retailers to also decrease the prices of commercial ordinary rice.
Further assuring cheap rice supply in the markets, Mr. Busaran noted that the provincial office has requested 230,000 bags of imported rice from its central office.
He added they have so far received only 50,439 sacks and that the rest is still to come.
Reynaldo H. Legaste, South Cotabato government chief agriculturist, said they are projecting more than enough commercial rice supply for the province until the end of the year.
"For the entire year, palay harvest is expected to reach 218,348 metric tons, which when converted into rice would be about 141,928 metric tons. The rice consumption in the province is placed at 93,000 metric tons so we still have a surplus of nearly 50%," he told reporters.
Busaran said the provincial grains agency has a P10 million budget for palay procurement starting January "but has not been utilized since farmers prefer to sell the harvest to private traders due to higher buying price."
NFA-South Cotabato is presently buying dried palay at P13 per kilo, with P1.50 of that coming from the provincial government, he said. (BSS)
