Philippine Business Today

The National Food Authority (NFA) will spend about P8.5 billion to buy 500,000 tons of paddy rice locally during the peak harvest season and may not need to tap markets overseas, a senior state official said on yesterday.

The Philippines, the world’s biggest buyer of rice this year after contracting 2.3 million tonnes of the grain from overseas sources, will focus on local purchases for now to ensure a stockpile worth 25 to 30 days of rice consumption by the end of December, said Ludovico Jarina, deputy administrator at the state grain agency National Food Authority (NFA).

"We are going to buy heavily from the local market,’’ Jarina told Reuters. "We will buy about 500,000 tons from the farmers.’’

"It is the most logical thing to do now. You help the farmers and you can store it (paddy rice) for a year. You buy rice from the market and you can store it only for six months,’’ he said.

The Philippines has approached Thailand and other Asian neighbours for a guaranteed rice supply after world rice prices shot up to record levels in April due to export curbs imposed by some rice-producing countries to control local inflation.

Vietnam agreed in June to supply 600,000 tonnes of rice to the Philippines, but others have not budged.

Thailand said on Thursday it planned to release 2.1 million tonnes of rice to exporters by the end of September amid swelling domestic supply that was pressuring already falling world prices, but it was unclear if it would sell to the Philippines.

The NFAs raised earlier this year its domestic rice buying price to P17 a kilo from the previous P11, with an extra incentive of P1,800 worth of free fertilizer for

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