Manila approves rice import

Manila approves rice import

MANILA (Reuter): Manila has approved the import of a total of 850,000 tons of rice for buffer stocks next year, National Food Authority (NFA) deputy administrator Gregorio Tan said yesterday.

"(NFA) was given a standby authority to import 500,000 tons rice next year. This is on top of the 350,000 tons standby authority given to us earlier," Tan said at a news conference.

The Philippines had rice stocks inventory of 1.3 million tons as of September 1 this year, he added.

"This level is 18 percent more than the stocks we had in the same period last year," he said.

Of the total rice stocks inventory, the NFA has 500,000 tons in its warehouses.

The average Philippine daily rice requirement is 22,000 tons, Tan said.

Tan said the country's rice imports next year could rise to between one million and 1.2 million tons due to prospects of an acute shortage triggered by the El Nino weather phenomenon.