Under Rice Tarrification Law: 2.4m rice farmers will weak to uncontrolled rice imports

College Editors Guild of the Philippines on Tuesday said around two hundred farmers have been killed under the fascist regime of Rodrigo Duterte.

But as if it’s still not enough, he wished to starve them to death through passing the Rice Tarrification Bill into law last February 15.

Under the Rice Tarrification Law, the CEGP said that about 2.4 million rice farmers will be gravely vulnerable to uncontrolled rice imports, while enduring a measly P6,000-month income on the average amidst worsening economic crisis.

Consequently, 19 million metric tons of national “palay” production will be jeopardized by allowing unrestricted rice importation under the newly signed law.

Instead of addressing hunger and poverty leading to deaths through prioritizing crop production and the overall development of the country’s agricultural sector, President Duterte is eager to ravage the country’s self-sufficiency and selfeliance for food to favor foreign agricultural exporters and his masters in the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Unlike Duterte and his cohorts, the Filipino youth and people know that the only way to address food insecurity is by distributing the land to the tillers, as well as the development of the agricultural sector and national industries. But since Duterte is hell-bent on killing the toiling Filipino people, one way or another, the only option is to relentlessly fight his immensely anti-people regime.

Meanwhile, ACT Teachers Representatives Antonio Tinio and France Castro lambasted the enactment of the Rice Tariffication Act into law, saying President Duterte has failed to fulfill another promise, this time to eradicate poverty and hunger. The solons said that this law will abandon 3.6 million rice farmers and rice farm workers, their families and the Filipino people through heavy importation of our primary agricultural product and staple food.

Tinio said that the enactment of the Rice Tariffication law will be another broken promise by the Duterte administration

“This measure will not solve the never-ending rice crisis in the country; rather it would make us a rice consuming country that is import dependent begging for cheaper rice,” he said.

In a statement, he said that the Rice Tariffication Act was the Duterte administration’s purported solution to the record high inflation rates in the country.

“This measure unfortunately will not solve the continuing rice crisis and high inflation and will only lead to bigger and more problems in the future for our fellow Filipinos especially rice farmers and workers,” Castro said.

“The Duterte administration has been implementing policies that would destroy and kill agricultural industries while turning its back on the clamor of the Filipino peasants for genuine agrarian reform and government support to help farmers increase their production without burying them in a lifetime of debt,” Tinio added.

“There is no guarantee that the rice tariffication will lower the prices of rice in the market but will definitely decimate the rice industry in the country,” Castro added. “Napakarami nang ipinangako ni Pangulong Duterte. Nangako siyang tatanggalin niya ang gutom sa bansa, tataasan daw niya ang sweldo ng mga guro at kawani pero ang kongkretong nagawa ng kaniyang administrasyon ay panatilihing mababa ang sahod ng mga guro at kawani at lalong ginugutom ang sambayanang Pilipino sa kaniyang mga anti-mamamayang polisiya.” (PR)