January 7th, 2025
House Ways and Means Chair Joey Sarte Salceda (Albay, 2nd district) released the following statement in response to the December 2023 inflation report.
The rice price situation is showing signs of improvement. Month-on-month, prices declined by 0.7 percent, a modest but nonetheless real reduction in price. More importantly, year-on-year rice prices are at 0.9 percent, significantly below the overall inflation rate of 2.9 percent. That means rice is no longer a drag up for consumer prices.
I credit this partly to the actions initiated by the Speaker in response to the Murang Pagkain Supercommittee’s proceedings. By December, the Speaker compelled major rice industry players in Central Luzon to reduce rice prices. We expect more reductions in January and February.
The problem seems to be corn, as I have persistently pointed out in recent months. Corn inflation is at 5.0 percent year-on-year, and that dragged up meat inflation to 4.9 percent, as the principal input.
Murang Pagkain will be discussing corn and meat next when we reconvene, probably next week. We will also push the DA to carry on with its proposal for a rice price emergency.