DA: No shortage of agriculture products this holiday season

November 9, 2024 | 12:00am

MANILA, Philippines — A ranking official of the Department of Agriculture (DA) yesterday assured the public that there will be no shortage in the supply of agriculture products, including lechon, amid the expected increase in demand during the holidays.

At a press conference, Agriculture Assistant Secretary and spokesman Arnel de Mesa said the damage brought by the successive typhoons on farm commodities will be compensated through importation.

“We will have no problem as we are able to balance this through the importation of rice and fish. For vegetables, we have enough supply as we have so much production of highland vegetables.

For lowland (vegetables), we have a problem but the recovery is fast,” De Mesa said.

The agriculture official added that the movement in the retail price of pork can be attributed to the increase in demand and the impact of the outbreaks of African swine fever (ASF).

“This (price increase) is the combined effect of the increase in the demand this last quarter plus of course we still have the problem of ASF,” De Mesa added.

Hog raisers have already recovered from the ASF scare, according to De Mesa.

At the same time, he assured the public of enough supply of lechon during Christmas as he confirmed the increase in the demand of the dish using native pigs.

“We have many native pigs, particularly in Southern Tagalog, Quezon (province and) Cavite areas. The native pigs were also affected (by ASF), but we have many production of native pigs,” De Mesa said.

He added that there will be no problem in the supply of chicken and eggs.

De Mesa said that a P1 to P2 per kilo hike is expected in the retail price of rice in December amid the increase in demand.

“Normally, there is also a movement in vegetables and pork. For rice, we are still hoping that it will go down. For chicken and eggs, we don’t expect movement. For onions, we expect the retail price to go down and for sugar, it is pretty stable,” he added.

Based on DA’s monitoring, the retail price of pork shoulder ranged between P275 and P360 per kilo; pork belly, between P310 and P395 per kilo; whole chicken, between P140 and P220 per kilo and medium-sized eggs, between P8 and P9 per kilo.