NFA to buy 800k bags of palay in WV until December

The National Food Authority (NFA) aims to buy 800,000 bags of palay in Region 6 until end-2020, Regional Manager Dianne A. Silva said.

“Notwithstanding our accomplishments from January to June, we were given a catch-up plan to procure another one million bags for July to December so that is about 300,000 bags higher than our target for the year,” Silvda said.

She added that NFA administrator Judy Dansal also instructed the regional office to procure another 500,00 bags of palay on top of the catch-up plan.

With the ₱15.06 per kilogram prevailing buying rice of palay in Western Visayas based on the October 8 monitoring report, local rice farmers here are advised to dry their palay and sell them directly to NFA to avail the support price of ₱19 per kilogram.

From January until October 8, the agency has procured a total of 1,278,452 bags of palay where the bulk of the procurement are from the provinces of Iloilo and Capiz.

“About 30,000 to 35,000 bags are being procured daily by the NFA Region 6,” Silva said.

She cited that in September 2020 alone, Region 6 is second to Cagayan Valley in terms of the highest volume of palay procured from local farmers.

NFA Region 6 has 727,369 bags of buffer-stocked rice enough for 12 days of consumption should there be occurrences of natural disasters in Western Visayas.

“Gusto ta lang ipaathag sa ila nga ang pagbaligya nila sa NFA is also a positive undertaking sang mga farmers groups nga mabuligan ang ahensya nga ma-attain nila ang target sa buffer stocking. Bal an man naton nga ang buffer stocks sang NFA is intended for provision in times of calamity,” said DA Western Visayas Regional Executive Director Remelyn R. Recoter.

Western Visayas recorded 753,832 metric tons of palay production in the first semester of the year which is 12 percent higher than last year’s volume of production.

She added, “we are really positive that our production for the year will be double-digit percentage increase because the first semester alone is already 12 percent increase from 2019 of the same period.”

Recoter said more than 50 percent of rice production areas in the region are yet to be harvested and she is hopeful that the majority of the farmers will be considering selling their produce to NFA.

Acknowledging that the lack of drying facilities here bar farmers from delivering their palay to NFA, Recoter said that the Philippine Center for Postharvest Development and Mechanization shall reach out to other farmers cooperatives and associations in the region to provide them with machinery support under the Rice Competitiveness Enhancement Fund RCEF. (Sheila Mae H. Toreno/DA-RAFIS 6)