Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. assured Negrenses on Thursday, June 5, that government will be selling good quality rice at P20 per kilo until 2028, and that farmers’ palay will be purchased at fair market prices.
“We have to serve the consumers and we have to protect the farmers,” Laurel said at the launch of the P20 per kilo rice program at the Burgos Public Market in Bacolod City.
Bacolod City is the first area in the Negros Island Region where the P20 per kilo rice program has been launched, DA-NIR Director Jose Albert Barrogo said.
Laurel and Bacolod Mayor Alfredo Abelardo Benitez said they were delivering on the promise of President Ferdinand Marcos to sell rice a P20 a kilo .
The freshly milled rice sold on Thursday was produced by farmers in Bago City, Valladolid, and San Enrique.
The instructions of the president is to make sure good quality rice is sold at P20 a kilo until 2028, Laurel said.
The P20 a kilo rice is being sold to members of vulnerable sectors such as indigents, senior citizens, persons with disabilities, and solo parents.
The supply to be sold until December will be subsidized by the national and local government, Laurel said.
The national government will fully shoulder the subsidy needed for the sale of the rice at P20 a kilo to 15 million households nationwide from Jan. 1, 2026, until the end of the president’s term in June 30, 2028, he added.
Laurel said he has asked Congress to increase the budget of the National Food Authority (NFA) so it can purchase more palay from the farmers at the right price.
The buying price for palay is currently at about P24 a kilo, he said.
Laurel said an amendment to Republic Act No. 11203 or the Rice Tariffication Law (RTL) would enable NFA to increase the amount of rice it buys from 5 percent of the country’s total produce to 10 t0 14 percent.
Brenda Burdeos, project development officer IV of the City Cooperative and Livelihood Development Office, said the NFA rice being sold at P20 per kilo in Bacolod on Thursday was freshly milled.
The rice was delivered directly to the Bacolod City government, it did not come from an NFA warehouse, Burdeos said.
She said 480 sacks of rice were allocated for roll out at the Burgos, Libertad and Central markets, and at the Bacolod Government Center on Thursday.
The P20 per kilo rice will also be sold in the barangays later, she said.
The city government will be selling 400 sacks of rice daily until all of its 5,880 sacks are sold, which could last 10 to 11 days, Burdeos said.
The city government allocated P7.971 million as its counterpart and will be allocating more for the purchase of more rice, she added.*