PITC being used by smugglers to sneak in rice

Suspected rice smugglers are using the government-owned Philippine International Trade Corp. (PITC) to bring in some 160,000 bags of rice from Thailand worth $1.8 million.

The PITC sounded off the alarm over at least one shipment of rice unloaded at the Batangas port with documents identified as having been consigned to the National Food Authority for the account of the PITC.

However, both government agencies denied making this particular importation, admitting that although only one shipment had been discovered so far, the practice could be more rampant than officially reported.

By far the most sensitive and heavily protected commodity in the country, only the government is allowed to import rice depending on domestic production and consumption.

On occasion, however, the NFA authorizes accredited trading companies to import rice for the agency and the volume to be imported is auctioned among the qualified participants.

The PITC, an attached agency of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), also imports rice with the proper NFA authorization as part of its function to implement government-to-government countertrade agreements where the Philippines exports various products in exchange for rice.

According to PITC president Sylvia Veloso, the shipment was brought to the attention of the PITC when documents turned up claiming that the company imported 160,000 bags equivalent to 8,000 metric tons of long-grain white rice from Thailand.

Documents identified the seller as a Bangkok-based company, Capital Rice Co. Ltd. and the shipment, Veloso said, arrived in the Philippines in early December 1999 aboard a Vietnamese-registered vessel M/V To Lich.

Veloso said that copies of bills of lading and invoices provided to the PITC showed the order for Thai rice to have been made by the NFA for PITC's account, but she said the company never authorized the importation referred to by the documents.

She said PITC's 1999 authorization only covered some 10,000 metric tons of rice specifically from Vietnam and by December, this volume had already been imported in trickles and not in bulk.

The NFA, on the other hand, said it did not import the shipment either. NFA deputy administration Gregorio Tan said that in 1999, it authorized private trading companies to import some 70,000 metric tons of rice and only 60,000 to 65,000 metric tons were actually brought in.

"The NFA imports direct but as far as we are concerned, our last importation was made in June 1999," Tan said. "I don't know if this shipment was part of the volume that we auctioned to trading companies."

Tan also pointed out that it would not make any sense for the NFA to import rice in the name of the PITC since NFA was the regulatory agency that authorizes importation. "We don't have to use anyone's name because we are allowed to import direct," he said.

According to Tan, the NFA had no way of identifying who made the importation. He said the only way was for the Bureau of Customs to identify the importer and scrutinize their documentation.

The PITC said it has made the proper reports to the Department of Finance, Bureau of Customs and Task Force Aduana. "We only implement the countertrade program so we are counting on the NFA and the BOC to police the actual importation," Veloso said. "The PITC's name is being used without its knowledge and consent."