THE Cagayan de Oro City Price Coordinating Council (CPCC) has noted a 100 percent compliance of market vendors on the Suggested Retail Price (SRP) imposed by the National Government.
CPCC chairman lawyer Edgardo Uy said there is general compliance among market vendors in all the city's public markets, based on its regular monitoring.
Uy said they observed only small violations, such as incorrect tagging, but said that these are very negligible and can easily be corrected.
In an effort to provide cheaper rice but quality rice to consumers, the government has set SRPs for all kinds of rice in the market. For imported rice, the SRP is set at P39 per kilo, for well-milled, and P40 per kilo for imported premium grade two.
For local rice, the SRPs are: P39 per kilo for regular-milled, P44 per kilo for well-milled, and P47 per kilo for premium grade rice.
"In fact, we also observed that some vendors are selling what appears to a well-milled rice at only P38 per kilo, when in fact he can sell it up to P44 per kilo. We thank them for following this new regulation," he said.
Initially, Uy said some vendors were defiant and did not participate during the SRP launching last week in Cogon Market.
The vendors were concerned that they will suffer loses if they will be forced to sell their stocked rice, which they bought at an expensive price, to a lower price because of the SRP implementation.
But Uy said this was already resolved after the National Food Authority (NFA) advised the vendors to classify their stocked rice to the "special rice" classification, which has no prevailing SRP.
"We are urging the public to report to us the violators so that appropriate penalties will be imposed against them," he added.