January 8, 2025 | 12:00am
MANILA, Philippines — Total rice imports last year rose to a new all-time high of almost 4.7 million metric tons (MT) as the country turned to foreign supplies to plug its shortfall in domestic stocks and temper retail prices of the staple.
The country’s rice imports in 2024 reached 4.68 million MT, nearly 30 percent higher than the 3.61 million MT recorded in 2023, based on Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) data.
Vietnam remained as the country’s top rice supplier, cornering three-fourths of the total import volume or about 3.56 million MT. It was followed by Thailand at 598,157 MT and Pakistan at 283,517 MT.
The country also imported rice stocks from the following countries: Myanmar, India, China, Japan, Cambodia, Taiwan, Italy and Spain.
Government officials earlier attributed the increase in rice imports to the need to beef up domestic supplies amid the extreme weather conditions faced by farms in the first half of last year.
The lowering of rice tariffs to 15 percent from 35 percent, as ordered by President Marcos through Executive Order 62, also contributed to the increase in import volume as it encouraged private entities to purchase more abroad.
The economic measure was meant to temper and prevent further spikes in retail rice prices that have been identified as one of the culprits behind faster inflation in the country last year.
The country’s annual average inflation last year slowed down to 3.2 percent from six percent in 2023 caused by lower increases in food and non-alcoholic beverages, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
Rice inflation alone has been on a downward trend since it peaked at 24.4 percent in March last year.
The country’s rice inflation in December 2024 settled at 0.8 percent, the slowest rate in three years, based on PSA data.
However, the average annual rice inflation last year was estimated at 15.8 percent, faster than the 8.1 percent recorded in 2023.
In a related development, nationwide rice inventory as of Dec. 1 last year expanded by more than a third on an annual basis to a two-year high of over 2.5 million MT, according to the PSA.
In its latest report, the PSA said the country’s rice stocks reached 2.55 million MT, about 34.5 percent higher than the 1.89 million MT recorded in December 2022.
The latest rice inventory was the highest in two years or since the 2.65 million MT recorded in November 2022.
“Month-on-month, the volume of rice stocks inventory recorded an increment of 3.6 percent from the previous month’s inventory of 2.46 million metric tons,” the PSA said yesterday.
The higher nationwide rice stocks were driven by higher supplies recorded in the National Food Authority (NFA) warehouses and commercial entities.
More than half of the recorded inventory or about 59.1 percent came from commercial sector while 35.2 percent came from households and 5.6 percent were from NFA warehouses, according to the PSA.
Rice stocks in commercial entities expanded by 77.1 percent year-on-year to 1.51 million MT from 851,880 MT on the back of higher import volume.
Meanwhile, rice inventory in NFA warehouses more than doubled to 144,050 MT from 57,130 MT driven by better palay procurement performance.
Household rice stocks, however, fell by nine percent year-on-year to 897,920 MT from 986,780 MT, based on PSA data.
“In comparison to the November 2024 rice stocks levels, increments were noted from the commercial sector by 6.3 percent and in the NFA depositories by 1.7 percent,” the PSA said.
“Meanwhile, rice stocks inventory from the households decreased by 0.4 percent,” it added.
Be the first to comment