The smaller pan de sal

When I was growing up in Gingoog City, the sweet smell of breads being baked in the wood-fired ovens of Visayan Bakery would be wafted to our house across the street. It was my pleasant duty to buy pan de sal, costing P.05 each, for breakfast. For snacks, I bought some such delights as ensaymada, pan de lemon and pan de coycoy and those with coconut and chocolate fillings and sexy shapes. When I turned homemaker, bread was my family’s daily staple, and I took bread and cake-making lessons from the famous sisters Edna and Sylvia Reynoso. Baking was, and is, fun. But the fun in buying breads these days is somewhat diminished by the rising cost of pan de sal (P4) and pan Amerikano (P67). Is this due to the rising cost of flour?

The other evening my media group learned that the cost of baked products could even go higher, what with the threat of Turkish flour taking over the market in the future. Aptly, the owner of XO restaurant had all sorts of bread as table decor – pan de sal and bread with sesame seed coating and French bread. The topic of the evening was the need to impose higher tariff on imported flour from Turkey to the Philippines.

According to Ric M. Pinca, executive director of the Philippine Association of Flourmillers, Inc. (PAFMIL), they have 11 flour millers as members who are seeking Philippine government support to increase the import duty on imported Turkish flour from 7 percent to 20 percent duty to prevent “dumping” into the country of imported Turkish flour – in order to save the Philippine flour milling industry. In short, they wish to stop “export dumping” of Turkish flour to the Philippines.

Dumping, said Ric, occurs when a country like Turkey exports a commodity at prices lower than the domestic price existing in their country.

For example, in 2010, while flour cost $600 per metric ton in Turkey, its export prices to ASIAN countries were only $284 to Indonesia, $276 to the Philippines, $317 to Thailand, $250 to Malaysia and $277 to Singapore. Turkey exporters can do this business practice because they are heavily subsidized by their government.

In 2011, domestic price in Turkey was also $600 per metric ton, but its export prices were much lower. It was $388 to Indonesia, $388 to the Philippines, $455 to Thailand, $385 to Malaysia, and $424 to Singapore.

Said Ric : “Due to subsidies provided by the government, Turkish millers are able to export flour, a finished product, at prices even lower than the raw material costs in other countries.”

“While it may be true that Turkish flour at present represents only 10 percent of flour usage in the Philippines, Turkish flour exports to the Philippines have been increasing throughout the years so much so that, coupled with its dumping scheme, there is real danger of Turkish flour eventually killing the local flour milling industry.”

The sad thing is that Turkish flour dealers sell their products directly to bakery owners in the Philippines who naturally buy Turkish flour that is cheaper than the locally milled flour. 

Ric said that in 2012 alone, the volume of Turkish flour arrivals in the Philippines grew by 84 percent. “With the historical growth of Turkish flour exports to the Philippines pegged at 75 percent, it is just a question of time when Turkish flour will swamp the country and kill the local flour milling industry.

“The cheap price of Turkish flour is just a temporary enticement intended to get customers and displace local producers. But once local millers have been shut out of the industry, the Turkish exporters will surely raise their prices. And by then, no one can do anything.” What will happen is the loss of jobs for thousands in the local flour milling industry, and, said Ric, “We will be at the mercy of Turkish flour exporters and their local distributors.”

The Philippines imports wheat from the United States and mills it into flour locally.

The US Wheat Associates, the export market development organization representing US wheat farmers, believes in the value of an open trade environment in which the participants compete fairly and openly. “Unfortunately when it comes to the flour export trade, the policies of the government of Turkey are fully responsible for the dumping of Turkish flour in the Philippines,” said Ric.

Another ironic thing is that a 102.6 percent duty tax is imposed on flour exported to Turkey, yet it vehemently opposes a 20 percent dumping duty the Philippine government plans to impose on Turkish flour. Turkey wants to export its flour to other countries but prevents any country from exporting even a single sack of flour to Istanbul through a whopping 102.6 percent duty.

Until the government heeds the call of our local millers, we can expect our bakery products to become more expensive. And our pan de sal to be smaller.

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Anak Mindanao (AMIN) Party-list Representative Sitti Djalia Turabin-Hataman is seeking to promote a positive image of Muslims in the country, and she looks at fashion as a platform for this advocacy.

The congresswoman plans to be an entrepreneur, her idea that of creating her own Hijab fashion line and Muslim accessories.

She wants to incorporate Muslim culture with her design of the Hijab – a veil that covers the hair, neck, and chest, down to the ankles, and makes the wearer of all ages and sizes look chic, at the same time “retaining the essence for which it is worn,” says the first lady of the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao. Her husband is the present ARMM regional governor Mujiv Hataman

The legislator says the Hajib can be styled in varied ways as long as it covers the hair and neck. “The value is modesty, so I think the simpler the better.”

There are traditional scarves sold in Muslim shops and at mega malls. But her line, says the congresswoman, “promises to be better, with apparels to match.”

Representative Hataman says the business will benefit the women of Mindanao. A former columnist of the Daily Zamboanga Times, she founded a women’s organization, Pinay (PINK), and also served as the first executive director of the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos.

She says her experience in working with and for families in conflict areas “gave me the opportunity to share deeply their plight, fears and aspirations.” But as a development worker with NGOs, her engagement with them was limited to hearing and documenting their stories. Now, as a legislator, she can do more for women empowerment in Mindanao. She has refilled bills filed by AMIN when her husband was its representative in the 15th Congress. These bills include the Anti-Racial Discrimination Bill, Mandatory Study of Muslim and Indigenous People’s History and Culture, and the institutionalization of a Zone of Peace in conflict areas. She is also drafting a bill to promote organic agriculture, economic opportunity and environment protection, and looking into the possible revision of the Code of Muslim Personal Laws, particularly in the areas of marriage, divorce and inheritance.

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E-mail: dominitorrevillas@gmail.com