Farmgate palay price down 30% in mid-Sept
Credit to Author: EIREENE JAIREE GOMEZ| Date: Thu, 03 Oct 2019 16:18:17 +0000
THE national average farmgate price of palay (unmilled rice) declined in the second week of September to P16.18 per kilogram, down 30.1 percent from P23.14/kg a year ago, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said.
In its weekly update on palay, rice and corn prices, PSA said the latest average quotation of the staple was also lower by 0.6 percent than P16.28/kg in the previous week.
The continued drop in locally produced palay was blamed on the implementation of Republic Act 11203, or the “Rice Tariffication Law,” which allowed the unlimited entry of cheap rice from other countries.
Since February, the Philippines’ rice imports have reached 2.4 million metric tons (MT), about 17 percent of the country’s total consumption requirement for the year, according to the Federation of Free Farmers (FFF).
Annually, the Philippines imports only 10 percent of its domestic needs, given that the country is 90-percent rice self-sufficient.
PSA said prices of well-milled and regular-milled rice posted year-on-year decreases at wholesale and retail trades.
The average wholesale price of well-milled rice declined by 16.8 percent to P38.43/kg from P46.18/kg in 2018.
In retail trade, its average price went down by 14.2 percent to P42.27/kg from P49.27/kg last year.
For regular-milled rice, the average wholesale price dropped by 21.2 percent to P34.29/kg from P43.49/kg. Its retail price, meanwhile, was quoted at P37.79/kg, down 17.8 percent from P45.96/kg a year earlier.
In the same report, PSA said farmgate prices of yellow corn grain went down by 10.9 percent to P13.23/kg from P14.85/kg year-on-year.
Its equivalent price for white corn grain, on the other hand, fell by 2.1 percent to P14.18/kg from the previous year’s P14.48/kg.
During the period, the wholesale price of yellow corn grain increased by 3.3 percent to P21.54/kg from its year-ago level of P20.86/kg. Its retail price of P26.04/kg was a 3.5-percent increase from the P25.16/kg recorded a year earlier.
For white corn grain, the average wholesale price was pegged at P17.37/kg, up 0.2 percent from its year ago level of P17.33/kg. Similarly, the average retail price of white corn grain went up by 1.6 percent to P26.70/kg.