House reps urge Senate to pass bill vs skyrocketing rice prices

An inch away from final approval, members of the House of Representatives urged their counterparts in the Senate on Monday to pass, if not adopt, a pending bill widely believed to curb the skyrocketing price of rice.

Deputy Speaker David "Jay-jay" Suarez lamented that instead of preempting the recurrence of corruption in the National Food Authority (NFA), senators should take into consideration the country's rice crisis, which continually puts a financial strain on the consuming public.

"If we can pass this and enact it and implement it quickly, we can immediately reduce the price of rice by almost P15," Suarez said in a press briefing.

"I think that in itself is an objective we should all be united for. So I hope the Senate can act on that."

House Bill 10381, which seeks to modify Republic Act 8178, or the Agricultural Tariffication Act, previously amended by the Rice Tariffication Law (RTL), is set to pass the House plenary on Tuesday following a marathon of exhaustive hearings.

However, its prospects remain unclear in the Senate as the "majority" of senators are against reinstating NFA's regulatory and import licensing functions, citing previous instances in which the agency was embroiled in various corruption scandals.

Senator Cynthia Villar, the chairperson of the Senate Committee on Food and Agriculture, posits that Congress should instead pass the proposed Anti-Agricultural Economic Sabotage Law, which would impose severe sanctions on smugglers, hoarders, and cartels believed to be the culprits behind the soaring prices of staple grain.

House leaders, however, are keen that HB 10381 has enough safety nets to ensure that the NFA has fewer chances of corruption.

Meanwhile, Taguig Rep. Amparo Maria Zamora wanted senators to consider adopting the House version to expedite its passage.

"Although there are only three days left, we hope that our Senate counterparts would just adopt the House version so that there is no need to go through bicam, and therefore, the passage will be faster, this amendment to the Rice Tariffication Law," she said.

Zambales Rep. Jefferson Khonghun and La Union Rep. Francisco Paolo Ortega V joined their peers in prodding the Senate to act with urgency.

"We are pleading with our counterparts in the Senate that it is also for the security of rice in the country, I hope they will think carefully and pass this law," Khonghun said.

"While they have yet to provide any alternatives or amendments, we are still hopeful that they will act on this because it is already treated as an urgent measure," Ortega chimed in.

House members are rigid about reinstating NFA's import mandate to shrink the price of rice, citing the increase in competition with commercial traders.

Affordable NFA rice, which was then sold at P27 per kilo, was pulled out in the markets pursuant to RTL enacted in February 2019 during the Duterte administration.

The RTL abolished NFA's powers to regulate the rice sector, license market players, inspect warehouses, and track stock movements while liberalizing rice importation.

The prices of rice have been relatively high, and the trend will persist until July as the agriculture sector reels from the impact of El Niño, according to the Department of Agriculture (DA).