The social problems rised by food prices and shortages continue... Who knows where they will take us! Now it is in Philipines.
April 22 (Bloomberg) -- Myrna Lacdao used to eat two meals a day. Now she eats one and gives the rest to her two grandchildren.
Lacdao, 53, shares a 70-square-foot shack in Manila's San Roque shantytown with her husband, two adult children and grandchildren. After the price of rice rose 41 percent in the past year, only the youngsters get three meals a day.
``I just take coffee in the morning and then have lunch at noon,'' said Lacdao, who makes pillow cases for sale to neighbors, contributing to the family's monthly income of 9,000 pesos ($215). ``That's my first and last meal of the day.''
Increasing global demand for food, speculation in commodities and rising fuel prices intersect in San Roque, where 8,000 families live in wooden huts with roofs made of scrap metal and plastic.
Rice futures had their biggest weekly gain in at least seven years last week on concerns export curbs by China and Vietnam will spread as importing nations struggle to feed their people. The Philippines, the biggest rice importer, received offers for only two-thirds of the grain it sought to buy on April 17.
A kilo (2.2 pounds) of rice cost 34 pesos last week on the open market in Manila, up from 24.07 pesos a year ago, according to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics. While the National Food Authority sells rice to the poor at 18.25 pesos a kilo, that accounts for only 10 percent of consumption, according to an April 15 report by analysts at Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc.
Empty plates may further undermine President Gloria Arroyo's administration in a country where street protests toppled leaders in 1986 and 2001. Her approval rating dropped to 27 percent in March, the third straight quarterly decline, according to a survey by pollster Social Weather Stations.
`Tipping Point'
``This could be the tipping point,'' said Earl Parreno, an analyst at Manila's Institute for Political and Economic Reforms. ``Her statements must cascade into concrete steps that would put food on a poor man's table.''
The National Bureau of Investigation is pursuing traders suspected of hoarding rice and officials who conspired to repackage subsidized grain for sale on the open market. The administration said this month it would spend 43.7 billion pesos through 2010 to boost rice production.
``The government is sparing no effort to ensure that our supplies of rice get from the source to the tables of Filipinos throughout the nation,'' Arroyo said in an April 15 speech.
San Roque sits on 30 hectares of government property the squatters claimed because they can't afford their own land.
There are no roads or sewage system. More than half the people of working age are unemployed, community leader Ruben Coprado said.
Rice, Vegetables
Coprado, who sells soap, coffee and charcoal to small shops, spends 9,000 pesos a month on food for a family of five, 80 percent more than last year. They subsist on rice, vegetables and fish, eating meat just once a week.
``Most people in the neighborhood only eat rice with instant noodles or sardines just to get by,'' he said.
Magdalena Onia, 27, earns as little as 50 pesos a day scavenging plastic and wire from a nearby dump. She used to have running water and electricity for a single light bulb.
Now, the cost of feeding her five children is so high she fetches water from a common well and uses candles.
``Some days, I can't even send them to school because we have nothing to eat,'' Onia said.
The Philippines imported 1.9 million tons of rice last year, or 16 percent of its needs.
About 15 percent of last year's rice crop was spoiled because of a lack of drying facilities or lost during milling and delivery, said Frisco Malabanan, director of the government's hybrid rice program.
World Bank
The Philippine government shouldn't have followed a World Bank recommendation to stop stockpiling grain in favor of buying it on the world market, said Raj Patel, a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of ``Stuffed & Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System'' (Melville House, 398 pages, $19.95).
A June 2007 World Bank report said the Philippines should reduce grain stocks and use them for ``disaster mitigation and safety net programs'' instead of ``price stabilization.''
``The Philippines' government had been strong-armed in various ways into adopting the kinds of policies that militated against its being able to stockpile grain,'' Patel said.
National Food Authority Deputy Administrator Vic Jarina dismissed Patel's criticisms, saying the government keeps at least a 15-day supply on hand. The Philippines consumes 33,000 tons of rice daily.
San Roque sits four kilometers (2.5 miles) from a rice warehouse owned by the National Food Authority.
Rice shortages in 1995 prompted some residents to storm the warehouse and demand that officials sell them grain. Tensions are escalating again.
``We never see that National Food rice around here,'' Lacdao said. ``If it reaches a point when I can't even feed my grandchildren, I wouldn't think twice about jumping that high fence and breaking into that warehouse like we did in 1995.''
Luzi Ann Javier in Manila at ljavier@bloomberg.net Last Updated: April 21, 2008 18:22 EDT
April 22 (Bloomberg) -- Myrna Lacdao used to eat two meals a day. Now she eats one and gives the rest to her two grandchildren.
Lacdao, 53, shares a 70-square-foot shack in Manila's San Roque shantytown with her husband, two adult children and grandchildren. After the price of rice rose 41 percent in the past year, only the youngsters get three meals a day.
``I just take coffee in the morning and then have lunch at noon,'' said Lacdao, who makes pillow cases for sale to neighbors, contributing to the family's monthly income of 9,000 pesos ($215). ``That's my first and last meal of the day.''
Increasing global demand for food, speculation in commodities and rising fuel prices intersect in San Roque, where 8,000 families live in wooden huts with roofs made of scrap metal and plastic.
Rice futures had their biggest weekly gain in at least seven years last week on concerns export curbs by China and Vietnam will spread as importing nations struggle to feed their people. The Philippines, the biggest rice importer, received offers for only two-thirds of the grain it sought to buy on April 17.
A kilo (2.2 pounds) of rice cost 34 pesos last week on the open market in Manila, up from 24.07 pesos a year ago, according to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics. While the National Food Authority sells rice to the poor at 18.25 pesos a kilo, that accounts for only 10 percent of consumption, according to an April 15 report by analysts at Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc.
Empty plates may further undermine President Gloria Arroyo's administration in a country where street protests toppled leaders in 1986 and 2001. Her approval rating dropped to 27 percent in March, the third straight quarterly decline, according to a survey by pollster Social Weather Stations.
`Tipping Point'
``This could be the tipping point,'' said Earl Parreno, an analyst at Manila's Institute for Political and Economic Reforms. ``Her statements must cascade into concrete steps that would put food on a poor man's table.''
The National Bureau of Investigation is pursuing traders suspected of hoarding rice and officials who conspired to repackage subsidized grain for sale on the open market. The administration said this month it would spend 43.7 billion pesos through 2010 to boost rice production.
``The government is sparing no effort to ensure that our supplies of rice get from the source to the tables of Filipinos throughout the nation,'' Arroyo said in an April 15 speech.
San Roque sits on 30 hectares of government property the squatters claimed because they can't afford their own land.
There are no roads or sewage system. More than half the people of working age are unemployed, community leader Ruben Coprado said.
Rice, Vegetables
Coprado, who sells soap, coffee and charcoal to small shops, spends 9,000 pesos a month on food for a family of five, 80 percent more than last year. They subsist on rice, vegetables and fish, eating meat just once a week.
``Most people in the neighborhood only eat rice with instant noodles or sardines just to get by,'' he said.
Magdalena Onia, 27, earns as little as 50 pesos a day scavenging plastic and wire from a nearby dump. She used to have running water and electricity for a single light bulb.
Now, the cost of feeding her five children is so high she fetches water from a common well and uses candles.
``Some days, I can't even send them to school because we have nothing to eat,'' Onia said.
The Philippines imported 1.9 million tons of rice last year, or 16 percent of its needs.
About 15 percent of last year's rice crop was spoiled because of a lack of drying facilities or lost during milling and delivery, said Frisco Malabanan, director of the government's hybrid rice program.
World Bank
The Philippine government shouldn't have followed a World Bank recommendation to stop stockpiling grain in favor of buying it on the world market, said Raj Patel, a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, and author of ``Stuffed & Starved: The Hidden Battle for the World Food System'' (Melville House, 398 pages, $19.95).
A June 2007 World Bank report said the Philippines should reduce grain stocks and use them for ``disaster mitigation and safety net programs'' instead of ``price stabilization.''
``The Philippines' government had been strong-armed in various ways into adopting the kinds of policies that militated against its being able to stockpile grain,'' Patel said.
National Food Authority Deputy Administrator Vic Jarina dismissed Patel's criticisms, saying the government keeps at least a 15-day supply on hand. The Philippines consumes 33,000 tons of rice daily.
San Roque sits four kilometers (2.5 miles) from a rice warehouse owned by the National Food Authority.
Rice shortages in 1995 prompted some residents to storm the warehouse and demand that officials sell them grain. Tensions are escalating again.
``We never see that National Food rice around here,'' Lacdao said. ``If it reaches a point when I can't even feed my grandchildren, I wouldn't think twice about jumping that high fence and breaking into that warehouse like we did in 1995.''
Luzi Ann Javier in Manila at ljavier@bloomberg.net Last Updated: April 21, 2008 18:22 EDT
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