A farmer uses a combine harvester on a rice field in Kikukamachi, Japan. AFP

The Philippines would have faced bigger troubles had it failed to pass a law opening the rice market to imports as part its obligations under the World Trade Organization (WTO).

This was reiterated by Senator Cynthia Villar amid complaints the recently enacted Rice Tariffication Law (RTL) has unduly disadvantaged rice farmers.

At the Senate inquiry on the coconut trust fund on Friday, Villar said the RTL, which replaced quantitative restrictions (QR) on rice with a 35 percent tariff on imports, resulted from the 1995 agreement with the WTO.

The agreement, Villar said, was meant to make the country’s rice farmers more competitive and productive.

“We signed an agreement with WTO giving us 22 years to do quantitative restrictions (QRs) and that already lapsed,” Villar emphasized.

“If you read the law, there is nothing wrong with it. Our economic managers said if we don’t honor our agreement with the WTO to liberalize the importation of rice, we would be in more trouble than we already are.”

Villar, who also chairs the Senate committee on agriculture and food, said there would be sanctions filed against that would cost the Philippines should the country fails to honor the WTO agreement.

The legislator also explained the government would not have to pass the RTL if it succeeded in making local rice farmers competitive while the WTO agreement was still in effect.

“Government officials, especially those at the Department of Agriculture (DA), were already in position when we were allowed a two-year extension by the WTO and we still did not make our farmers competitive,” Villar reiterated.

She maintained the RTL should help uplift the lives of local rice farmers by providing them funds to mechanize or buy inbred seeds through the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund (RCEF).

The government has earmarked P10 billion for the RCEF in anticipation of the influx of imported rice.