ILOILO – The National Food Authority (NFA) will not stop buying palay (unhusked rice) from local farmers. In fact, the grains agency targets to procure 150,000 bags this month as part of its palay-buying spree.
“For October, we are looking to procure around 150,000 bags of palay and just yesterday we already procured 29,000 bags. Ang average namon nga gina-procure daily is 10,000 bags,” NFA-Iloilo information officer Pat Espinosa said.
NFA-Iloilo currently buys clean and dry palay at P19 per kilogram.
Espinosa said that they prioritize small farmers, who have not sold their produce to the agency.
“We can buy a maximum of 200 bags of dry and clean palay from one farmer,” he added.
Espinosa is confident that they will reach or even surpass their target procurement this month. He noted that last September, they were able to buy 200,000 bags of palay.
“Our dryers are full and if they want magpasulod sa NFA nga labtong they should set a schedule para maplastar naton san-o sila makapa-dry,” said Espinosa.
Last month, NFA-Iloilo’s target only reached 130,000 bags of rice.
“Pero dala sang kadamuon sang nagabaligya sang palay sa NFA-Iloilo, nagsobra ini sang 70,000 bags,” he added.
NFA, according to Espinosa, will continue its mobile buying stations to reach and buy palay from farmers affected by the low palay prices in the different towns.
Mobile buying stations had already visited the towns of Lemery, Lambunao and Calinog, while municipalities of Cabatuan, Tigbauan, and Bingawan are scheduled in the following days.
The NFA-Iloilo had asked the municipalities to provide them with logistics like “hauling services from their buying station to the NFA” when they request for a mobile buying station in their area.
“That’s why we are asking help of the local government unit to provide us assistance most especially sa tracking,” Espinosa said.
For his part, Gov. Arthur Defensor Jr. vowed that with the help other mayors, he will provide tracking to haul bags of palay purchased by NFA from the farmers to be transported to its warehouses./PN
