Bill to replace NFA is the same as privatization – group

MANILA, Philippines – The proposed bill by Sen. Loren Legarda to dismantle the National Food Authority (NFA) and replace it with two new agencies is the same as privatization, according to the militant Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP).

“It is almost the same with the proposition of Sen. Edgardo Angara for proposing that the NFA to be stripped of its powers and be privatized instead. Senators Angara and Legarda has gotten it backwards because their so-called solution to the rice crisis will only make matters worse,” Rafael “Ka Paeng” Mariano, chairman of KMP and concurrent president of Anakpawis party list, said.

“Besides in Sen Legarda’s bill she says that the regulatory powers of the NFA will be assigned to a different agency but what is their to regulate anyway, when the official Macapagal-Arroyo policy is deregulation through trade liberalization,” he added.

Mariano also expressed fear that should the NFA be privatized, the rice cartels “will have a free rein on the market and they will become unstoppable.”

Instead of privatizing the NFA, Mariano proposed that the agency be strengthened “so that it can compete with the rice cartel and to have more supply than the cartel.”

In order to strengthen NFA, its procurement level should be increased by at least 25 percent, Mariano said.

At present, the procurement level of NFA less 1 pecent, he added.

“If allowed to happen, the privatization of NFA will be the prelude of skyrocketing rice prices worse than what we are experiencing today. The cartel will be the absolute lords of the rice market,” Mariano said. – GMANews.TV