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The rice crisis affecting the Philippines is not
caused by a shortage of rice but is a result of bad policies that
have hurt the agriculture sector, a leading economist said in a
report released Wednesday.
“The so-called rice crisis is
really an income crisis,” said Rolando Dy, executive director of
the food division of the Metro Manila-based University of Asia and
the Pacific.
President Gloria Arroyo
disagreed. She cited the country’s supposed capability to be an
international player in ensuring sufficiency of the staple of
millions of people in the world.
The Philippines is in good
position to address the “global problem” of rice supply given
its sound rice-management practices, President Arroyo said also on
Wednesday.
In her speech keynoting the 16th
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) Farmer’s Week
celebration in Cagayan de Oro City in southern Misamis Oriental
province, she noted that the country had “seen” the problem of
rice supply coming and has been parrying it.
Dy blamed “underinvestment in
agriculture and infrastructure, a poor record in eliminating poverty
[and] poor infrastructure quality,” for the crisis which has
forced thousands of poor Filipinos to line up for hours for
government subsidized rice.
“We cannot reap what we did not
sow. We failed in reducing rural poverty compared to other
countries,” such as China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and
Vietnam, he said.
The Philippines is one of the
world’s biggest rice importers and does not enjoy large contiguous
land areas with large river systems that allow China, India,
Thailand and Vietnam to grow huge amounts of rice, Dy said.
But he said other countries, such
as Malaysia and Singapore, which are more dependent on imported
rice, did not have long queues for rice and were not suffering from
the crisis as badly as the Philippines.
Dy added that rice consumption in
the Philippines was so high because much of its population was still
poor and could afford to eat nothing else.
“There are so many poor people
here, the only food they can afford is a mound of rice and some
catsup [tomato sauce],” he said.
The Philippines could raise
productivity but it had not properly invested in agriculture or its
support infrastructure, such as irrigation and farm-to-market roads,
Dy added.
He said government was investing
little in research and development, building substandard rural roads
and not putting enough irrigation in potential growth areas such as
those in the southern region of Mindanao.
Dy also complained that an
agriculture modernization law that took effect in 2000 was not
getting adequate funding.
Graft and corruption supposedly
also hurt the agriculture sector with rural infrastructure being
built to poor standards.
The rice crisis might even be a
blessing in disguise because it “will spur production and even
investments,” in agriculture which will have a positive effect in
the long run, Dy said.
But he added that the rice issue
is “a problem not just of the executive branch . . . it is a
problem of the legislative and judiciary,” as well.
Dy said there is likely to be
“some correction in rice prices in the next 12 months but not
dramatically,” remarking that world rice prices will not return to
levels seen in 2006.
Also in her speech at the
Farmers’ Week celebration, the President said rice management is
“not only a national problem, this is not only an Asean problem,
it is a global problem that we had seen coming.”
“In the Philippines, we have
worked to head it off for some time now,” she added.
Mrs. Arroyo pointed out that the
country’s rice-management practices are based on three fundamental
needs: supply, distribution and crackdown on crooked rice traders.
“To ensure supply, we have
reached out to our Asean neighbors who happen to be among the big
rice-exporting countries long before the shortage hit and have
invested heavily in rice-production efficiencies and also in new
strains especially our hybrid rice,” the President said.
Mrs. Arroyo added that government
is guaranteeing the immediate distribution of rice to those who need
it most by tapping the help of churches, faith-based groups and
schools, in addition to the government distribution network.
“We are making sure that anyone
caught robbing the people of rice is punished,” she said.
-AFP And Angelo S. Samonte
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