RP can extend rice import controls, says WTO
The World Trade Organisation (WTO) has allowed the Philippines to keep its quantitative restrictions on rice imports until 2012, says Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap.
"The approval was dated December 27, 2006, but we got it only in mid-February," Yap said in an interview last week.Negotiations for the extension took more than two years, because other WTO member countries contested it. The previous quantitative restriction on rice expired in June 2005. To get the extension, the government had to hold bilateral negotiations with nine countries: the United States, Thailand, Australia, Egypt, Canada, Pakistan, Argentina, India and China. The extension will give the farm sector time to improve efficiency and competitiveness before full liberalisation of the Philippine rice market in 2012, Yap noted. Farmers will continue until then to enjoy protection from a possible influx of lower-priced rice that may come from Thailand and Vietnam, the world's two largest rice exporters, he said. As a developing country, the Philippines is allowed by the WTO to give its agriculture sector a subsidy or support equal to 10 per cent, or about 85 billion Philippine pesos (Bt63.15 billion), of the sector's gross-value receipts. However, budgetary constraints prevent the government from implementing support pro?grammes for the rice sector, Yap said. The WTO approval of the extension is "very timely, because it is only now that the government has the political will and the money to boost rice production in the country", he said. The Agriculture Department hopes to increase rice output by promoting use of high-yield hybrid and certified seeds and rehabilitating irrigation facilities covering close to 250,000 hectares of land planted with rice. "If we stick with this programme, we will become self-sufficient by 2010," Yap said. "Funding for repair and rehabilitation of irrigation facilities needs to be constant," he noted. "That's the fundamental investment we are looking into so we can recover at least 200,000 hectares by 2010." The four-year plan for irrigation repair requires a budget of 14.5 billion pesos. He said for this year alone, the department was targeting the rehabilitation of 52,000 hectares of irrigated farmland, which would cost 3.1 billion pesos, based on a repair cost of 60,000 pesos per hectare. The Philippines plans to import up to 1.6 million tonnes of rice this year.
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