EDITORIAL - Meat holiday

In a rare mass action, hog raisers staged a “pork holiday” last weekend to press the government to stop rampant meat smuggling. The protest has cost Efren Nuestro his job as director of the Bureau of Animal Industry while executive director Jane Bacayo of the National Meat Inspection Service resigned last Wednesday. Still not appeased, hog raisers have vowed to stage a longer pork holiday, with poultry growers threatening to stage their own “chicken holiday.”

Meat producers aren’t the only ones complaining about unfair competition posed by smugglers. Business groups representing various sectors have aired similar complaints for many years. But the only thing that changes, it seems, is the contraband of choice. This probably depends on who calls the shots or has the right connections at Customs. At various times in the recent past, there have been complaints about the proliferation of smuggled canned sardines, onions, dressed chicken, pre-owned luxury vehicles, motorcycles and fuel.

Today it’s pork. Hog raisers estimate that they lose between P800 and P1,000 in earnings per pig as outlets offer cheaper imported pork. The other day, poultry growers, who have complained several times in the past about rampant smuggling of dressed chicken, joined the hog raisers in their protest.

Smuggling of dirt-cheap clothing, in addition to the legitimate entry of low-priced textiles and apparel from China, killed the local industry many years ago. Once past Customs, smuggled items are nearly impossible to track and confiscate. Ordinary consumers, happy to see items cheaper than the locally produced ones, are unlikely to complain or alert authorities about possible smuggled goods on supermarket shelves.

Even if civic-minded citizens wanted to, they wouldn’t know where to send an alert. It certainly won’t be the Bureau of Customs, which is widely perceived – as reflected in surveys – to be crawling with coddlers of smugglers. Now the Bureau of Animal Industry is being lumped together with the BOC in the smuggling problem. If the administration of daang matuwid or the straight path can deal decisively with this problem, it would be a remarkable achievement.