Press Release
April 24, 2008

LOREN URGES MEASURES TO SOLVE RICE CRISIS

Senator Loren Legarda has urged the approval of measures that would address the crisis in the high price of rice and other food commodities during the meeting of the Legislative Executive and Development Advisory Council in Malacanang yesterday.

At the same time, she appealed to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyoto sign into law the bill establishing a "Magna Carta for Micro Small and Medium Industries" (MSMEs) which has already been passed by the conference committee of both houses of Congress.

Loren also appealed for the early passage of the bill for the establishment of barangay livelihood and skills training centers to promote economic development in the rural areas and the bill amending the Agri-Agra Law to expand the amount of credit to farmers, fisherfolk and agrarian reform beneficiaries.

She also urged support for a Senate resolution providing for a congressional oversight committee on climate changethat threaten the capability of the country to produce sufficient supplies of rice and other food products.

Loren said that another bill she filed, SB 75, would amend the Agri-Agra Law to ensure the availability of more credit to farmers, fisherfolks and agrarian reform beneficiaries by removing the option of investing in government securities as a form of alternative compliance to the law.

Loren said that her bill would free more funds for credit to agricultural workers, thus improving their capacity to produce more rice and other food crops to reduce the price of the commodities and stave off the hunger of the people.

"All these bills, MSMEs, the barangay livelihood proposal, climate change resolution and the farm credit measure, would help ease the price crisis in rice and other food commodities by encouraging an d ensuring more productivity, especially of rice and other staples, in the rural areas,' Loren stressed.

Loren said that the MSMEs bill has already been passed by the bicameral conference committee of the Senate and House of Representatives. It will soon be transmitted to the President for her signature to compete the process of enacting the bill into law.

The MSMEs bill, once enacted into law, would strengthen Philippine micro, small and medium enterprises, enabling them to engage more effectively in food production, including the production and processing of rice, corn, root crops, poultry and livestock, and other commodities.

Citing data from the National Statistics Office, Loren said that MSMEs accounts for 99 percent of all registered business establishments of the country, employing 70 percent of the entire labor force.

"By strengthening micro, small and medium enterprises," Loren said, "we would be able to increase employment and boost the income of our people, thus enabling to cope better with the current crisis in food prices."

Loren is one of the principal authors of the bill which provides more fiscal incentives to micro, small and medium enterprises, attracting more investments to the sector and providing more government support in the form of technical assistance and training to private entrepreneurs in the sector.

Loren also informed LEDAC that the bill a Barangay Livelihood and Skills Training Act, which she also co-authored and sponsored, has already been approved by the Senate on second reading, and is awaiting approval on third reading.

She appealed to LEDAC to support the bill in the House of Representatives so that it could be quickly enacted into law. "I believe that this bill will further stimulate economic development in the countryside by enabling the government to provide effective training and skills to our workers to improve their productivity in farm, fishery and industrial work," said Loren.

The farm credit bill would put a ceiling of P50 million on the credit that banks would extend to farmers, fisherfolk and agrarian reform beneficiaries, Loren said.

The barangay livelihood and skills training measure would also boost farm production, especially of rice, because it would improve the skills of the rural population to produce rice, aside from other food commodities, Loren declared.

Loren observed that higher productivity of food and other commodities in the countryside would help pull down prices. She made the observation in connection with the participation of the National Price Coordinating Council in the LEDAC meeting.

She also informed LEDAC that the Senate has passed a resolution creating the Congressional Oversight Committee on Climate Change. She pointed out the importance of the measure on the food crisis by citing a report by the US Department of Agriculture that 14 percent of the Philippines' agricultural output is lost through climate change.

All these measures, according to Loren, namely, the micro, small and medium enterprises Magna Carta, the barangay skills development bill and the Agro-Agra law amendment and the Senate resolution on climate changecan strongly influence a lowering of the prices of food commodities.

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