PRESIDENT Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who also serves as the secretary of the Department of Agriculture (DA), has directed the agency to speed up the importation of thousands of metric tons of sugar in order to stabilize the price of the commodity.
Under DA Memorandum Order No. 77, Series of 2022, signed by Agriculture Senior Undersecretary Domingo Panganiban on Dec. 20, 2022, Minimum Access Volume (MAV) Secretariat officer-in-charge and executive director Jocelyn Salvador was ordered to immediately convene the MAV Advisory Council.
This is in line with Marcos’ order for the DA “to take action and to stabilize sugar prices,” as the President was “concerned” with the “very high inflation rate.”
In particular, the DA said that based on the November 2022 inflation report, the annual inflation increment for sugars, confectionery, and deserts has reached 38%.
With this, the MAV Advisory Council was directed to convene to “expedite the importation of 64,050 metric tons of refined sugar through the MAV mechanism.”
MAV refers to the volume or quantity of a specific agricultural commodity that may be imported with a lower tariff. The MAV is a commitment of the Philippines to the World Trade Organization to facilitate trade between countries.
Meanwhile, the United Sugar Producers Federation of the Philippines (UNIFED) appealed to Marcos to stop the importation while sugar milling is at its peak.
UNIFED president Manuel Lamata said, “We are at the peak of harvest [season], and we have abundant stocks of raw and refined sugar; as such, we see no need to import sugar at this time.”
“We are appealing to President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. to halt this importation of refined sugar through the minimum access volume mechanism until the results of a post-assessment of sugar stocks after the end of the milling season can be conducted,” Lamata added.
The UNIFED chief said that the group is not necessarily against importation, but “to do it now will be disastrous to our local sugar farmers.”
Lamata added that in the past three weeks, “millgate prices of sugar have gone down, and if this further goes down with the entry of imported sugar, the sugar farmers will be facing a double whammy.”
Philippine Chamber of Agriculture and Food Inc. president Danilo Fausto, however, said that importation is necessary to bring down the price of sugar.
“If it is really necessary to bridge the supply…as long as we import what is needed. Hopefully, it brings down the price. Price is a function of supply and demand,” Fausto said. (GMA Integrated News)
