Tarlac government opposes privatization of NFA

MANILA, Philippines - The government’s proposed privatization of the National Food Authority (NFA) may hit a snag as the country’s grains retailers gained the support of the top officials of Tarlac, the home province of President Aquino.

Tarlac Gov. Victor Yap and Vice Gov. Pearl Angelie Pacada signed a pact of unity recently with the NFA Employees Association-Courage (NFAEA-Courage) National Board representing 15 regions of the country.

Under the pact, the signatories vowed to protect and defend the mandate of the NFA; work against privatization, decoupling and abolition of the NFA; aggressively fight for the rights of employees, workers, and stakeholders; pursue crusade for zero-graft NFA; and unite stakeholders’ effort to enhance delivery of service.

Roman Sanchez, president of the NFAEA National Board, told The STAR that they are urging the President to re-examine the government’s position on the abolition of the NFA.

“Stakeholders in the grains industry and local government units are one with the view that food security is national security,” he said.

He said many advocates strongly believed that sound economic policy prescribes state interventions, including subsidies, as it promotes business activity.

“If NFA is abolished, privatized or given zero subsidy, the state would in effect be abdicating national food security to the private sector which amounts to ceding the task of national defense to private security agencies,” he added.

Sanchez also hit government pronouncements on zero budget for domestic palay procurement in the 2011 budget.

“It’s a prescription for another rice crisis, rice import dependency and inducing growth of a new breed of rice cartel that may held hostage the government,” he said.

Baby Tenorio, chairperson of the Provincial Farmers Action Council (PFAC), an umbrella organization of over 100 farmers organizations and grains stakeholders in Bulacan, also stressed that local farmers will again live at the mercy of commercial rice traders.

Tenorio said referring to the P17 per kilo procurement price of the NFA is favorable to farmers as commercial traders used to buy palay from them at P11 per kilo.

Serafin Manalili, the manager of NFA-Bulacan, earlier told The STAR that they have procured over 200,000 bags of palay annually in Bulacan alone since the 2008 rice crisis.

He said locally procured rice along with imported rice serves as their buffer stocks and prevents commercial traders from hiking  the price of milled rice and hoarding its supplies.

“They cannot just hoard rice because we have enough supply.  If they reduce the rice they are selling, we can easily flood the market with rice as we have enough rice in our inventory, and that keeps the rice price stable,” Manalili said.