Posted on October, 17, 2023 at 10:02 am
THE Philippines’s rice imports this year may decline by 18.42 percent year-on-year to 3.1 million metric tons (MMT), as higher world grain prices dampened traders’ appetite, a high-ranking official said.
Agriculture Undersecretary for Rice Industry Development Leocadio S. Sebastian said the country’s rice imports for 2023 could be 700,000 lower than the 3.826 MMT volume recorded last year as higher world rice prices discouraged importers from bringing in foreign stocks.
“Rice abroad is expensive. [The importers] are looking at local production and they can buy local, that is okay with me,” Sebastian told reporters on the sidelines of the 6th International Rice Congress in Pasay on Monday.
The country’s rice imports from January to September declined by almost 12 percent to 2.672 MMT from 3.035 MMT recorded in the same nine-month period last year, Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) data showed.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) earlier projected that the Philippines could become the world’s top rice importer this year with a total estimated volume of 3.9 MMT.
In the past five years (2018-2022), the Philippines has been the second largest rice importer four times (2018, 2020, 2021, 2022) and the top importer of the grain once (2019), based on USDA data.
In a related development, Sebastian pointed out that the agriculture department targets a rice self-sufficiency level of about 85 percent to 87 percent this year.
The target was estimated using the level of rice production in relation to the country’s demand. (Related story: https://businessmirror.com.ph/2023/10/10/rice-sufficiency-level-falls-to-24-year-low/)
Sebastian attributed the higher sufficiency level to better productivity this year due to the “interventions” made by the national government amid a declining costs of inputs.
Sebastian added that the goal of the Marcos Jr. administration of hitting the 97 percent rice self-sufficiency is attainable using the production-versus-demand formula.
“What we are after is higher production locally vis-a-vis local demand. That is why that is the formula we are using. if we will use that, we will have a higher sufficiency level,” he added.
In a separate interview, Agriculture Assistant Secretary Arnel V. De Mesa said the country’s rice self-sufficiency would improve this year due to higher yield and bigger harvest area driven by lower costs of inputs.
“We do not expect in a few years to reach 100 percent [rice self-sufficiency]. The target of the government is to go near 95 percent to 97 percent in the coming years,” De Mesa said.
Source: Business Mirror