rijst

[buizesmurf]

Zo juist een progamme gezien op canvas "ter zake" Ging over rijsthandel en de schaarste ervan in 2008.De filipijnen komen uitvoerig aan bod in dit progamma.Mischien toch eens even kijken via "net gemist" zeker de moeite waard voor iedereen die met de filipijnen begaan zijn,en dat zijn we hier zeker allemaal dacht ik.......

[Kano]

More imported rice here


Philippine Daily Inquirer  07/29/2010


MANILA, Philippines–More shipments of rice imported by the previous Arroyo administration are arriving in the country in spite of a glut. Militant farmers and senators are demanding for the surplus commodity to be distributed to poor households.

Danilo Bonabon, National Food Authority (NFA) director in Central Visayas, Wednesday said that around 2 million bags of rice were arriving in Cebu City until the end of August for Central and Eastern Visayas and the cities of Pagadian and Dipolog.

He said this shipment would be on top of the 2.6 million bags of imported rice stored in different warehouses in Cebu, Bohol, Siquijor and Negros Oriental.

Lito Banayo, newly appointed NFA chief, Wednesday said he was asking the Department of Justice to investigate why the NFA under Arroyo had authorized the Philippine International Trading Corp. (PTIC) to import 20,000 metric tons of rice from Vietnam in spite of the surplus.

"We ourselves asked for the delay of the shipment. We're oversupplied. Why did we allow the importation through the PITC? Unless we're hiding something," he said by phone.

It's the NFA that has the mandate to import rice, not the PITC, he stressed.

Bonabon said the volume of imported rice would just be enough for Central Visayas. He said that the NFA should have buffer stocks good for one month in their different warehouses as a policy.

The militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) Wednesday urged President Benigno Aquino III to distribute surplus rice to the more than 4 million Filipinos who, he said in his State of the Nation Address, were eating less than three meals a day.

"If we are indeed swimming in rice, then the Aquino government should just distribute the excess rice for free so that it will not go to waste," said Felix Paz of the KMP national council.

"It is the best way to resolve this dilemma and is hitting two birds with one stone. The excess rice will be utilized and the poor will be given food even for just a few days," Paz added.

The group was reacting to a report on Tuesday by Banayo that the country was "swimming in rice" because the Arroyo administration had imported seven times more than the country's needs.

Banayo said that the NFA under Arroyo had authorized the importation of some 20,000 metric tons of rice estimated at P100 million in late April or May despite the oversupply in the local market. He said that the shipment had started to arrive at Poro Point in La Union.

Mr. Aquino on Monday said that rice was rotting in warehouses while the NFA had accumulated debts totaling P177 billion.

Senate inquiry urged

Senators Edgardo Angara, Jinggoy Estrada and Loren Legarda echoed the KMP demand.

"It's unconscionable that while people are hungry, there should be an oversupply of our basic need," Legarda said. "If there are stockpiles of rice that are not rotting, they should be distributed to the poorest of the poor."

Legarda has introduced a resolution calling for an investigation into claims of rice oversupply.

"Government should make a plan on how to distribute the rice to the hungry, especially those in the poorest provinces," Estrada said.

June to August are regarded as "lean months," said Angara, adding that the NFA should release the imported rice now, "otherwise the traders will make a killing."

Paz urged Aquino to stop relying on imported rice and take measures to ensure a steady supply of the Filipinos' staple diet.

He said that the government should issue a moratorium on conversions of rice land to other uses. He pointed out that lands allotted for rice now comprised just 3.28 million hectares, or 10 percent of the country's total land area.

Paz noted that 90 percent of the population consumed rice every day but such a small percentage of land was now being used to cultivate the country's staple food.

Low price of palay

"Aside from this, more than 4.2 million farmers and agriculture-related workers rely on our staple for their jobs but it is often neglected. While billions are being spent just to import rice, the price of palay (unhusked rice) remained low," he said.

According to Paz, the price of palay could go as low as P4.50 a kilogram during harvest time, lower than the price of hog feed now pegged at P5 a kilo.

"What the new administration must do now to completely eliminate rice importation, whether legal or illegal, and to implement genuine agrarian reform because this is the key to our food self-sufficiency," Paz explained.

"If the farmers own the land they till and they are mandated to plant rice to feed the nation then we would not have to face another rice crisis again, but as it is, 7 out of 10 farmers do not have their own land and we hope that Noynoy will give us what we want," he said.

Agrarian reform policy

Mr. Aquino has so far remained silent on his policy on agrarian reform, a key demand of leftist movements fighting for social justice, particularly on how he will deal with a farmers' clamor for the distribution of his family's Hacienda Luisita.

This year, the NFA allowed private companies to import special varieties through the PITC. This had been projected to bring the total rice imports this year to 2.45 million tons.

Late last year, the country tendered 2.05 million tons of white rice from abroad for 2010, but rising prices forced the NFA to buy only 1.82 million tons for delivery until June this year.

[ganda]

Heb het gezien.
De eindconclusie was wel ontnuchterend, het grootste rijstonderzoekproject van de wereld ligt op de Filipijnen. M.a.w. het lot van miljoenen mensen is in de handen van één der corrupste landen.

( zijn niet mijn woorden, maar die van de journalist )

[Kano]

Philippines swimming in rice amid high imports



By TERESA CEROJANO
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

MANILA, Philippines -- The world's biggest rice importer, the Philippines, is now "swimming" in the staple grain because of massive imports by the previous government that drove world prices to record highs and possibly enriched corrupt officials.

With government-run warehouses full and some flood-damaged rice stocks rotting, the National Food Authority, the state-run grain importer, has stopped new import orders for this year and asked Vietnam to delay its shipments until September, the agency's administrator Lito Banayo said Friday.

More than just food, rice is also a potent political weapon in a country where a third of its 94 million people live on $1 a day. The administration of former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who stepped down last month after nine years in power, had put in place a policy of subsidizing rice to be sold at a cheaper price for the poor.

Faced with rising global food prices in 2008 and 2009 - and riots in some countries - the government went on a shopping spree, apparently fearful of shortages, according to the administration of Arroyo's successor, President Benigno Aquino III.

"We've hardly touched the amount that we imported," Banayo told The Associated Press in an interview. More than 2.2 million tons (2 million metric tons) out of the 2.48 tons (2.25 million metric tons) so far delivered this year are still in government warehouses, he said.

Government buffer stocks, reserved for food emergencies in case of a lean harvest, have now been extended to last 56 days from 30 days previously, he said.

"We're swimming in rice," he said, adding that he had ordered "no more imports for 2010."

Aquino, in his first state of the nation address Monday, blasted the excessive purchases, which he said were sometimes three to seven times more than needed.

"Is this not a crime, letting rice rot, despite the fact that there are four million Filipinos who do not eat three times a day," Aquino said.

Banayo said he was awaiting findings of an audit team that he is forming, but suspected that corruption can be partly blamed.

"When you're talking of volumes this high and when you're looking at the prices at which they were procured, which are often higher than world market prices ... I guess somewhere along the way, some people made a pile," he said.

In 2008, when Philippine purchases pushed world prices to historic highs, the government may have miscalculated industry and household stocks, Banayo said. Or it could have relied on faulty statistics from the Department of Agriculture "so much so that we may have panicked and because of the panic, we over imported and caused world prices to go up."

He said he was baffled why the former administration still approved importation of up to 3.53 million tons (3.2 million metric tons) this year despite having enough stocks.

Former Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap defended the purchases, saying the imports were decided by a collegial body that involved other government agencies. He also pointed out that 2008 was the year of the global food crisis, while the Philippines lost 1 million tons of rice to typhoons last year.

Yap said no one reported to him any unusually large volumes of spoilage. He said any spoilage could be a result of mismanagement of stocks and not of oversupply.

Farmers and civil society groups on Friday called on the food agency to dispose of its surplus rice in the next two months by giving it away to the poor and selling the rest at the lowest price. They say it would bring down the prices of rice in the Philippine market - which ranges from 18.25 pesos ($0.40) per kilogram for subsidized rice to around 60 pesos ($1.30) for high-quality rice.

"Rice, as a staple food of Filipinos, has been the source of corruption and politicking," said Jaime Tadeo, president of the National Rice Farmers' Council. "The rice farmers always get the worst end of the deal while the rice traders, corporations and corrupt government officials manage to fill their money bag, intact and secured."