There is no reason for consumers in typhoon-devastated areas to fear a rice shortage.

This assurance was issued National Food Authority (NFA) administrator Jessup P. Navarro in response to concerns by people in Regions 1 and 2, including farmers who lost hundreds of millions worth of palay.

Navarro stressed the NFA had been positioning its rice stocks in the regions to guarantee the stability of supply and prices, particularly after landslides blocked roads in La Union, six towns in Ilocos Sur and scores of communities in the Cordillera Autonomous Region (CAR).

The NFA chief explained it is the agency's policy to keep large inventories of grain in provincial warehouses for quick dispatch of stocks to areas hit by calamities, whether man-made or not.

By doing so, Navarro added, NFA can respond quickly and stop speculators from keeping stocks away from consumers in order to artificially raise prices.

Under the law, the NFA is mandated to buy 10 percent of the entire palay production in the country.

The volume corresponds roughly to the official annual rice production deficit.

To show just how prepared NFA is, Navarro said government raised the volume infused to the National Capital Region (NCR) from 35 percent to 40 percent. This effectively blunted any speculation that could have driven prices to zoom skyward.

Moreover, stocks were positioned earlier in key provincial capitals and large towns to make good on the agency's promise to bring rice where it is needed.

NFA has been infusing more rice to the Cordillera and in Cagayan Valley, where harvestable grains were submerged and consequently damaged by the flood.

"NFA's rice positioning paid off in the case of Baguio City, where there is no rice shortage and where the price remains affordable to consumers," said Navarro.

As of the third week of October, NFA Benguet has a total of 75,037 bags, which are good for 34 days based on the average daily sales of 2,228 bags.

The whole of Ilocos Region has 1.8 million bags of rice, sufficient for the 132 days based on the average daily regional sales of 14,108 bags.

In Cagayan Valley, the regional rice inventory is 881,347 bags, which is enough for 142 days based on the average daily rice sale of 8,037 bags.

"It is important for us to maintain sufficient rice supply nationwide," said Navarro.

NFA has 24,000 active market outlets in the entire country.

Navarro said the agency has 24 million bags of rice going into the third week of the current month.

On a gross basis, the stocks are ample enough to satisfy the agency's average daily rice sales of 128,307 bags. The volume is equivalent to 34 days food security requirement based on the country's daily rice need of 35,400 metric tons or 708,000 bags daily.