Hunger [Will] Strike
The duty of the government is to ensure the welfare of its citizens. To use its resources to help its people meet their basic needs like food, clothing, home, and education. Unfortunately, given its track record, the government (especially this administration) is a failure. Now, our food supply is threatened.
The public’s attention was now focused on the sector of agriculture because of the current news that the Philippines will experience a shortage on supply of rice. Rice traders estimated the price of rice would hit forty pesos per kilo. Pessimists, on the other hand, predicted seventy pesos per kilo of rice by the month of July. The current price of decent and edible rice is now 32 pesos per kilo and this price will not go down according to the think tanks of International Rice Research Institute (IRRI). The culprit? Nations that export rice decided to stop their exportation and stock their supply of rice to feed their own people.
In the past, the Philippines have more than enough supply of rice. In the past, our country is the center of research on rice. Now, the Philippines depends on exportation to ensure that there will be enough supply of rice in the country, thanks to inefficient system of agriculture and land conversion. With the grim picture of rice supply in the world, we will be forced to beg for rice to other country. With the current price of rice, Filipino people were forced to wait in line for two hours just to buy two kilos of rice from NFA (National Food Authority) rolling store.
The impending rice shortage resulted from the government’s inefficiency and the business sector’s shrewdness. Because of land conversion, many agricultural lands were transformed into residential areas. Because of the government’s inefficiency, the true essence of Comprehensive Agrarian Reform was not realized. Because of syndicates inside the government, NFA rice were stolen, repacked, and sold as commercial rice. Finally, because of the sheer corruption of this administration, funds (take note the Fertilizer Scam) were sent to political friends of the Arroyos as funds for fertilizer even in highly urbanized areas.
The business sector, specifically the rice traders also caused the high price of rice. Because of their greed, many of these rice traders and middlemen buy rice in very low price from the farmers and sell them in astronomical price to the rice retailers. Many them also hide their stock of rice to induce increase of price of rice.
The government must stop the conversion of agricultural lands, support the farmers, and stamp out the syndicates in NFA.
We should all act now or else the lines will get longer and many people might die of starvation.
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Read other bloggers take on this issue. Please read Let’s Rice to the Occassion, Philippine Rice Crisis: Catalyst for Arroyo Downfall?, Philippine Rice Crisis Deepens, “Rice Crisis”: government is doing everything except the right thing.
Filed under: Society | Tagged: NFA, rice, rice crisis
[...] read Hunger [Will] Strike that talks about my stand on the looming rice crisis in the [...]
But how? What steps should we take?
If you look at the forces who are poised to take over after the Arroyo administration is over, the answer to your question i think is : start gathering requirements and find yourself an employment abroad. 5 million OFWs all over the world will tell you that, that is the most sensible thing to do by any Filipino today.
Why should you suffer for none of your doing of undoing?
Do you really expect change? Why? Are there differences say, bet Mar Roxas and PGMA? I mean do they have solution to unemployment? Have you heard any of them talk about issues?
To geekcritic:
There are many things that we could do to stop the impending rice shortage. Stop the land conversion, revolutionize the local system of agriculture, prioritize and support our farmers.
We must all realize that importation of basic needs like food is a big no-no because if their is a economic recession or a catastrophe, countries that export rice will protect their own people and stop their exportation of foodstuff.
to rltjs:
I agree with you that the most sensible thing for any of us to do is to fly away from this hell of a country, work abroad and save our own belly and the bellies of those people we love.
Staying here equates to being dead. Sending Filipinos abroad to work may help our economy during this time, but our country will suffer in the long run. Think about brain drain.
Between PGMA and Mar Roxas? I choose none of them, they’re both trapos. They talk on helping the masses, but do they what they speak. I do not think so.
What we need is a revolutionary overhaul of the system or a catastrophic event like the French Revolution.