Nothing to worry on the
reported rice shortage
THERE is nothing to worry despite the noted rise in rice market price.
Assuring Boholano listeners at the weekly Kapihan sa PIA, two of Bohol’s key rice industry observers said Bohol in fact has enough stockpile of rice when it raised its sufficiency level from 86% to about 110% in the last cropping season.
Bohol Agricultural Promotion Center Manager Engr. Eugene Cahiles in fact said he is still positive that this cropping season would be generally good for Bohol.
Citing available data from his office, Engr Cahiles said Bohol has released about 25,000 bags of hybrid and certified rice the whole year, but in the single cropping season in November of last year, they have released 22,000 bags.
“Barring any abnormal situation, we are expecting a good harvest and it should even raise our sufficiency level much higher,†Cahiles said.
With an average farm production of about 3.5 tons per hectare, the 22,000 bags would be yielding roughly 66,000 tons for this cropping season alone.
Meanwhile, National Food Authority assistant manager Ma. Fe Evasco bared that the rise in prices is still within normal limits, citing that the buying price is 17 per kilo and a trader would have to spend for the processing.
At P17.00 a kilo, a trader would have to sell it at P34.00 a kilo, but the prices at the markets are still below P30, she pointed out.
Well, maybe the dwindling stockpile brought about by the beginning of the planting season has caused it, Evasco said, referring to the price increase.
But, we are still seeing harvests ongoing, a fact that happened with the non-synchronized planting season in Bohol.
Last week, the country’s International Rice Research Institute speculated another round of rice crisis owing to the credit crunch that could be the effect of the global economic meltdown.
But with the full support of the government through the Department of Agriculture, Engr. Cahiles believes a rice shortage in Bohol is far from reality.
We still have a pending rice shipment ban as effected by the governor’s executive order, Cahiles said.
Aside from that, we are still buying rice from Mindanao, plus the regular NFA rice shipment is still in effect, so a rice shortage in Bohol is far off, he assured.
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