Rice

When I was a kid, my mother and grandmother would make me eat every single grain of rice in my little bowl, telling me to think of how much effort and toil the farmer expended to grow and harvest the rice (that was in the days when “planting rice is never fun, bend from morn til the setting sun...”). Thus I grew up with great respect for the rice farmer, and for the grain that sustains half – or more than half – of the world. In fact, rice is so basic to many Asian cultures the Chinese version of “how are you” literally translates to “have you eaten rice.”

Rice self-sufficiency is unarguably a most noble goal, for feeding our people is the most basic and most important task. However, after missing its self-sufficiency target for 2013, the government announced last week that it would no longer focus on rice self-sufficiency alone but rather on improving the agriculture sector as a whole.

For 2013, the Department of Agriculture trumpets 98 percent rice sufficiency. The government’s production goal for 2013 was 20 million tons of palay (a bit of trivia I picked up was that it takes 25 drums of water to produce a kilo of palay!) or 13.03 million tons of milled rice, more than the expected domestic demand of 11.23 million tons. However, with those vicious typhoons that visited us last year, production was pegged at 18.44 million tons (fortunately rice crops in many areas were harvested before Super Typhoon Yolanda hit in early November), which means meeting domestic demand, but it doesn’t leave much for buffer stocks. With Pinoys eating more rice per capita (119 kilos per person in 2012) and our population expected to hit 100 million by the end of the year, we will need 12 million tons of rice to feed our people. Thus we will certainly have to import rice this year, as much as 2 million tons, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.

In the middle of all these numbers is the area where the rice smugglers, their backers and their conspirators in government agencies operate. Rice smuggling is obviously not a small-time business – capital is big, volume is big, logistics and network extensive, and profits big enough to be worth all of that.  Something as big as this cannot be kept under the radar for very long, from buying lots in the international market (especially from foreign government rice agencies) to shipping the stock in to warehousing then distribution. Those in the industry – private sector and government – surely know about it, know who are engaged in it. Now, with the spotlight of public and legislative and even judicial attention focused on it, it is time to bring the nefarious operations of this group out of the shadows.  

* * *

When STARweek started back in February 1987, Hector Suerte, who was our layout artist, and I had a comic strip called “Singkit,” featuring a feisty little girl modeled after my niece. As we begin our 28th year, Hector sent us a new drawing of the little girl Singkit, all the way from the Middle East where he now lives. 

Thanks, partner!