Sugar liberalization will push through — DoF

The country needs to implement reforms to introduce competition in the sugar industry, which has been controlled by the big industry players.

DoF Undersecretary Fil Beltran said Filipino consumers are presently paying more than twice the global price of the commodity.

The Department of Finance (DoF) is actively pushing for the passage of a law that would allow import liberalization for the sugar industry amid heated opposition from lawmakers and industry stakeholders.

“We are active in lobbying for the opening up of the sugar market to trade. You are a consumer, I am a consumer and all of us are suffering because the industry is dominated by people who want to make the price (of sugar) higher,” Finance Undersecretary and chief economist Gil Beltran told the Daily Tribune.

“They are generating so much profit out of it. It’s time we give back to the consumer and (give them) what they deserve,” he added.

According to Beltran, the country needs to implement reforms to introduce competition in the sugar industry, which has been controlled by the “big industry players.”

Beltran underscored that the current quantitative restrictions (QR) need to be replaced by tariffs and safeguard measures for subsidized products.

QR imposed on sugar imports, for the past eight years, raised the blanket price of refined sugar to 235.8 percent above the export price of Thailand and 393.2 percent above the prices reported by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

“As a result of this, Filipino consumers are paying more than twice the global price of the commodity. (We are) all paying 2.5 times the sugar than in Thailand,” Beltran said.

The undersecretary further explained that once sugar import liberalization is in place, it would allow for more transparent and competitive pricing.

It would also let downstream industries to become “more viable and grow as fast as their ASEAN counterparts.”

Beltran maintained that the DoF is only doing a balancing act between regulating sugar prices and helping sugar farmers be more competitive with the farmers from neighboring countries.

“We are not leaning on the traders; we are leaning on the farmers. If anything, we are for the farmers. We need to make the sugar industry more competitive that’s why we are opening it up,” Beltran argued.

This week, Majority Leader Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri already expressed strong opposition on the proposed liberation, noting that it will affect five million farmers.

For her part, Senator Cynthia Villar told the Daily Tribune that she is not in favor of opening up the local sugar industry to trade.

“I am against it but the sugar stakeholders are too hard-headed that’s why the DoF is now asking to open the sugar industry. But I hope they could settle this because we are already facing problems with rice and we don’t want that to happen to sugar,” Villar said.

Based on the latest figures by the Sugar Regulatory Administration, the average retail price of raw sugar as of 24 September is P49.65 per kilogram; P56.61 per kilo of refined sugar, and P52.07 per kilo of washed sugar.

For the cropping year 2019 to 2020, local sugar production is estimated to reach 2.096 million metric tons.