SENATOR Cynthia Villar is against the importation of galunggong and the proposed legalization of smuggling rice in Mindanao.
Villar, who was the speaker in the 27th Visayas Area Business Conference and Expo at L' Fisher Hotel in Bacolod City yesterday, said the importation of fish is allowed under the law for processing but not for the wet market.
"Instead of doing the importation, we should encourage our fisher folk and help our aquaculture to produce more," Villar pointed out.
"What they are doing maybe, is they import for processing purposes but they divert it to the wet market if it has already reached the market," she said.
The importation of galunggong came out as government's move to address the high prices of fish and other marine products in the market.
Also, Villar said she is against the plan of Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol to legalize rice smuggling in Mindanao to address high prices.
"We cannot legalize smuggling in the country because it is against the law and nobody can go against the law unless the law is repealed. Large-scale smuggling of agricultural products is economic sabotage and is a non-bailable offense so nobody can disobey the law, even the President," Villar stressed.
Piñol said that smuggling has been a way of life in Mindanao especially in Zamboanga and other neighboring areas so he is suggesting to legalize rice smuggling in the area.
NFA abolition
Villar explained that in her years as senator since 2013, this is the first time that such a high price of rice happened in the country. "This is the worst," she added.
This is happening, she said, because the National Food Authority failed to protect the consumers and the farmers.
All the rice are with the traders because of the lack of supply of the NFA, she said.
She also explained that "we are now entering in the age of liberalization because the country's quantitative restriction on the importation of rice that was given to us by the World Trade Organization has already expired in July 2017."
"We are mandated to liberalize the rice importation Otherwise, we will be sanctioned. We also need to pass the Rice Tariffication to protect our farmers and we will impose a tariff on imported rice. We need to pass the bill so that during the liberalization, our farmers will be protected," Villar added.
She further said that the situation, NFA losses its mandate because rice importation would not only be limited to NFA.
"They would no longer be the rice importer. NFA is also not doing its mandate of buying locally produced rice. So why should we spend a lot of money for the agency? After the Rice Tariffication Law is passed, the Department of Finance will analyze the relevance of NFA under the new system of rice liberalization," she added.