Senator Cynthia Villar on Monday chided officials of the Bureau of Plant Industry for “not doing their job, resulting to the resurgence of cartel in the sale of garlic.
Villar even threatened to sue BPI if it would continue to fail to stop the cartels and smuggling of garlic.
During the hearing on the rising cost of garlic by the Senate agriculture and food committee, which she chairs, Villar berated BPI director Vivencio Mamaril for not doing his job.
“What has the Bureau of Plant Industry been doing? What happened to the High Value Crop Program, why is [garlic production] not increasing?” she asked.
Villar noted that they have this program to increase the production of certain commodity annually, buy in this case, it’s going down. It’s decreasing and not increasing,
She also threatened to file charges against the BPI in behalf of garlic farmers if it would not act on the garlic cartels and smuggling.
“I will be the one filing charges against you if the garlic farmers don’t. You are cartelizing garlic. You’re killing the farmers,” Villar said.”Why are you killing the industry? You want the industry to die so your cartel would thrive? Stop that!,” she said.
The senator also said she would ask the competitive commission to investigate the BPI. “I will file a case,” she reiterated to Mamaril.
Villar also scored the BPI chief for giving an irregular list of importers given permits to import garlic. The list did not show the name of the owners, the complete address of the trading companies and the import quantity they applied for.
Mamaril then asked Villar that BPI be given a day to submit a more comprehensive list.
But a visibly irritated Villar blurted out: “Stop pulling my leg. I’m tired of you!” Villar said, adding that she no longer wants the cost of garlic at P200 since it amounts to only P14 per kilo.
The Department of Agriculture earlier reported that 57,000 metric tons of garlic had been given import clearance by the BPI. As of May, some 12,140 metric tons had arrived. But Villar said the BPI should realize that it should should not be relying on importation.
She cited the need to help local producers to produce more to avoid being dependent on importation.
“I want them to help our garlic farmers to produce more. Because based on history from 2001 up to now, the production was inky half,” she said.
She recalled that when there was a garlic shortage in 2014, the findings showed there were manipulations such that the cost of garlic then was P300 per kilo.
“Now, the importation did not arrive. The production was bigger but the importation did not arrive. And if you look at the price, P100 per kilo is a reasonable price for garlic . If that’s P200 or P300 per kilo, tthere’s manipulation already,” Villar said.