Senator Aquilino Pimentel III on Sunday vowed to support a call in the Senate to abolish the National Food Authority due to the rice shortage and the staple’s soaring prices.
“‹He said he was disappointed at how the agency’s officials led by Administrator Jason Aquino were handling the issue.
The former Senate president said he no longer saw any purpose for the NFA’s existence.
He cited recent issues, including the rice crisis in Zamboanga City where the staple’s prices had been soaring.
He said the NFA’s job was to make sure the country had enough reserves of the staple to avoid any shortages that would affect consumers”•especially the poor,
Pimentel said he was also angered by the discovery of imported rice being infested with rice weevil or bukbok at the Subic Bay Freeport Zone.
“Why does the rice have weevil?” Pimentel said.
In a separate interview over dzBB radio, Senator Risa Hontiveros expressed frustration over the rice crisis in Zamboanga in Mindanao, where President Rodrigo Duterte comes from.
She said it was time to choose competent officials not only in Zamboanga but in the entire country because of the policy paralysis.
Based on the reports they had received, she said, the rice shortage was due to the lack of domestically produced rice that resulted in the importation of additional rice.
She also raised alarm over the high cost of rice.
“Let us help our farmers augment the rice reserves,” said Hontiveros who expressed dismay at the low farm gate price of unmilled rice of P17.