Rice, corn stocks up in April

MANILA, Philippines —The country’s rice and corn inventories went up in April due to higher stocks from both household and commercial warehouses.

In a report, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said total rice stocks reached 2.64 million metric tons (MT) in April, 12.8 percent higher than the 2.34 million MT recorded in the same month last year.

Rice stocks for the month comprised 52.4 percent from households, followed by 34.1 percent from the commercial sectors and 13.5 percent from National Food Authority (NFA) depositories.

“This month’s rice stocks inventories registered annual increases from the households by 17.8 percent, from the commercial sector by 9.7 percent and from the NFA depositories by 2.9 percent,” PSA said.

On a month-on-month basis, rice inventories grew by 40.7 percent from the 1.88 million MT registered in March.

Household rice stocks rose by 17.8 percent from March, commercial inventories grew by 9.7 percent and NFA depository levels slipped by 2.9 percent.

Monthly rice stock levels rose by 59.5 percent for the commercial sector and 52.3 percent for households while NFA depositories saw an 11.9 percent decline from March.

Meanwhile, the country’s total corn inventory increased by 23 percent in April to 803,610 MT from 653,350 MT a year ago.

“From the same month of the previous year’s level, corn stocks inventory recorded annual increases from the commercial sector by 23.6 percent and from the households by 20.3 percent,” the PSA reported.

It added that 81.2 percent of total stocks in April were from the commercial sector, while the remaining 18.8 percent were from households.

Month-on-month, corn stocks jumped by 72.5 percent from 465,860 MT in March. Inventories for households more than doubled to 150,930 MT, while commercial stocks rose by 64.6 percent to 652,680 MT.