Caused by NFA internal row on importation: Rice ‘left to rot’ at Cebu port

CEBU, Philippines - Container vans with at least one million bags of imported rice inside have been left stacked at the Cebu International Port since early March because of an ongoing top-level controversy within the Duterte administration over national rice importation policy.

Seemingly left to rot at the Port of Cebu, the rice came mostly from Vietnam and formed part of an allocation of 10,000 metric tons obtained by Pilmico Foods Corporation under the 2016 Minimum Access Volume (MAV) of the National Food Authority (NFA).

Documents at the Bureau of Customs in Cebu showed that only a shipment that arrived on February 21, 2017 containing 10,000 bags was released.

The one million bags of rice left Hanoi, Vietnam and arrived at the Port of Cebu on board MV SITC Fujian on January 21, 2017. The National Plant Quarantine Services Division Station 16 (Cebu) certified that the consignees complied with the pre-inspection requirements on February 28, 2017, which was the importation deadline specified by import permit number MAV-2016-0433 signed by NFA Administrator Jason Laureano Aquino.

Processing of subsequent shipments that arrived later could not meet the February 28 deadline when a policy disagreement on rice importations erupted at the national level.

The policy battle involved the clashing stands of the NFA Council, which advocated importations using private traders, while Aquino preferred government to government transactions.

A former Armed Forces of the Philippines mutineer, Aquino became familiar with rice importation procedures during his stint at the BOC during the time of Deputy Commissioner Jesse Dellosa, who was a retired Armed Forces of the Philippines chief of staff. Aquino, however, left when Dellosa linked him to the so-called “tara system” at the bureau.

Before his BOC stint, Aquino was named by former election commissioner Virgilio Garcillano as an emissary sent by former political affairs secretary Ronald Llamas.

As administrator, Aquino refused to implement an NFAC order that extended rice importation by private traders to March 31, which could have prevented the situation the Pilmico importation is currently mired in.

Based on an NFA March 31 report, the 2016 MAV rice importations brought in a total of 692,340 metric tons nationwide, with 99 percent already covered by the payment of advance customs duty through the Land Bank of the Philippines.

NFA records showed 92.38 percent of the MAV allocation already arrived through various ports in the Philippines covered by 728 import permits signed by the NFA administrator. Some 92,209.35 metric tons had been arriving at the Cebu port since January until March 2017.

Apparently, the NFA Council has empowered Aquino to approve the import permits up to March 31. But while Aquino signed the import permits, the processing of the shipments that arrived, like the shipments consigned to Pilmico, were stopped.

The row escalated and resulted to the dismissal of Malacañang Undersecretary Maia Halmen Valdez, after President Rodrigo Duterte believed the accusations of corruption against her. NFA records showed that only Aquino approved the import permits. —/ RHM (FREEMAN)