Pan de sal to be sold for P1 per piece only smaller

Filipinos will soon be able to buy their favorite pan de sal for P1 a piece.

According to Simplicio Umali Jr., president of the Philippine Baking Industry Group Inc. (PBIGI), there are plans to produce a smaller version of the breakfast staple and sell it for a peso a piece.

Umali said the smaller version of the bread would weigh only 20 grams, compared to the usual pan de sal priced at almost P3 per piece, which weighs 30 to 35 grams.

He said the bakers have agreed to make pan de sal more affordable and economical.

Umali said the low-priced pan de sal would be available late this month or early January.

Umali added they would be implementing more rollbacks on the price of bread at the same time.

The current price of a 600-gram loaf of bread would go down by P1 to P54.50 while a 250-gram 10-pack pan de sal will be P0.50 cheaper at P29.25 per pack.

The price of loaf bread is expected to go down by P8 and pan de sal by P4 only if flour millers follow global trends and reduce the price of flour to P600 per sack from the current selling price of P900 per sack, he said.

PBIGI calculated that local wheat prices are grossly overpriced, given that the price of wheat in the global market is $295 per metric ton.

This is almost three times lower than the earlier price of $910 per metric ton, they said.

Flour is now at P900 per sack from a high of P957 per sack.

Umali said their calculations showed that flour is overpriced. He said PBIGI have already asked the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to implement measures to force the prices of flour to go down.

However, Philippine Association of Flour Millers (Pafmil) executive director Ric Pinca said they have already reduced the prices of flour and it is now the turn of bakers to reduce the prices of their products as well.

“Loaf bread should not be sold for more than P50. They need to be fair because right now the capital needed to produce a 600-gram loaf is only P35,” Pinca said.

The government, on the other hand, is selling loaf bread at P40, more than P10 less than commercial loaf breads being sold in stores and supermarkets.

According to Pinca, the cheaper bread will be available for the whole month of December at all Tinapay ng Bayan outlets nationwide.

He said flour millers are located all over the country to help out in the distribution.