Food security advocates to stage rally against NFA

KIDPAWAN CITY — Food security advocates in North Cotabato are preparing to stage a rally in front of the National Food Authority (NFA) here to show their disgust over alleged anomalies in the agency’s rice importation program. Task Force Food Sovereignty (TFFS), an alliance of food security advocates in the province, urged Congress to conduct a full-blown investigation into the suspected multibillion peso anomalies at the NFA. They also want Congress to probe the “unholy alliance" among officials in the agency, traders and banks that, according to TFFS coordinator Abby Pato, has led to NFA’s overpriced rice imports, huge debts, and heavy losses. Citing data from the audit report of the Commission on Audit (COA), Pato said net losses of the NFA amounted to P100.921 billion from 2000 to 2009, and the agency incurred a ‘legacy debt’ which stood at P176.8 billion in 2010. TFFS also criticized government’s plan to privatize the NFA, citing the reported corruption in the agency’s private sector-financed (PSF) importation scheme which only “reinforces the cartel and the legalized smuggling in the industry." Pato said the COA report proves that transferring the vital task of procuring the grain to profit-oriented private traders only endangers the interest of the 90 million rice-eating Filipinos. Malu Cadeliña Manar/ELR/VS, GMA News