The DA said that the procurement price of the National Food Authority (NFA) will be pegged at R17 per kilo until yearend, a development that has spurred buying by traders at higher prices.

According to DA officials, the Arroyo government is bent on achieving 98 percent food sufficiency by 2010.

The DA is pushing for the wider adoption of seed varieties developed by IRRI that are higher-yielding, more adaptable to adverse weather conditions like drought and flooding, and more resistant to pests and plant diseases.

The department has assured consumers that there are adequate rice stocks but admitted the 10 percent gap between supply and demand will be addressed by NFA imports totaling 1.7 million metric tons (MMT).

The DA said it expects the summer harvest to surpass 7 million metric tons (MMT), which is higher than last year’s dry crop yield of 6.7 MMT.

According to the DA Rice Action Center headed by Undersecretary Jesus Emmanuel Paras, the palay harvests had already reached 5.89 million MT as of May 5, boosting DA prospects of hitting its 7.1 million-MT target this dry cropping season.

DA is also targetting increased production in the wet season of 2008 and preparing to go all out for the dry cropping season in 2009.

Top DA officials refused to speculate on the impact of the formation of the Organization of Rice Exporting Countries (OREC) but called on ASEAN memberstates pushing OREC to use the opportunity to group together and consolidate production volumes to ensure greater trade and inventory flows.

The negative impact of high food prices has been on the gains made against poverty and hunger in the last few years, they added.

Meanwhile, leaders of the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP) said pegging the farmgate price at R17 per kilo does not guarantee that NFA will secure the total of 10 percent of total Philippine rice production, which its charter has fixed.

They said there are rice stocks in the market but the problem is that the NFA insists on importing rice and contributing to the regime of high rice prices.

The agency is importing more rice to maintain a 30day buffer stock, which is double the inventory maintained during the traditional lean months of July to September, they said.

RP will weather shrinking world rice supply, says Arroyo

The country has adequate "national security stock" of rice following government’s prompt actions long before the global food crisis hit, President Arroyo said yesterday.

The President assured the public that the country will weather the shrinking world food supply and high prices, citing Manila’s friendly relations with the world’s top rice exporters.

"Traditional relationships are a key element as sellers are forced to choose between hordes of willing buyers and open wallets so the buyers who bought early are the only ones with rice," she said during lunch with members of the Soroptimist International in Malacanang.

The President said the government reached out to Vietnam and Thailand long before the shortage in rice and high prices in the world market. "This is a global problem and we saw it coming," she said. "We have worked to head it off for some time now," she added.

Mrs. Arroyo said some countries may may not be able to buy enough rice due to shortage in the world market. "It will not be for lack of funds but just the sheer unavailability of the rice," she said.

She explained that prices of oil and food, especially rice, have increased due to a combination of factors such as strong global demand, climate change, decreasing agricultural investments, encroaching urbanization, and the diversion of agricultural lands to biofuels production.

"All of these lead to a shortage which has been further exacerbated all over the world by panic situations and hysteria created by the media and political opponents in various countries," she said.

She noted that local traders, importers, and families "tend to stock up," which helped shrink the supply of rice.

The President said the government would sustain efforts to ensure rice supply through rice importation, investments in domestic rice production, efficient distribution to the people, and tough crackdown on unscrupulous traders who exploit the situation.