LINGAYEN–Even as commercial rice prices continue to increase, the National Food Authority branch in Western Pangasinan said it has 45 existing Bigasang Bayan outlets that sell cheap government rice at P18.25 per kilo.

Edilberto Libatique, NFA branch manager here, said the Bigasang Bayan outlets are spread in 22 municipalities and three

cities, with each one distributing their weekly allotted 30 bags of 50 kilos each .

Dagupan City has four Bigasang Bayan outlets located in its two markets, Libatique said.

He added NFA plans to increase the number of Bigasang Bayan stores in every town but only after inventories shall have been completed per a directive from the central office.

Libatique said his office cannot just release all their stocks to the market today in anticipation of the coming lean months which may last till October.

“We can not keep on releasing rice stocks from our inventory until our request for 2.2 million bags of rice for the whole region arrives,” he said.

The requested supply for Ilocos Region, including Abra, Baguio and Benguet will be sourced from rice imports.

Western Pangasinan, he said, needs an allocation of 200,000 bags of rice from the 2.2 million.

Libatique said the current stock in Western Pangasinan is 90,000 bags and more than 20,000 bags of palay are now being prepared for milling.

“We need to position this volume to meet the needs of the people during the lean months,” he said.

Libatique said Region 1 was allotted 432,000 bags from two boat loads of rice imported from Vietnam last February and March.

A third boat of imported rice that arrived last week is now being unloaded at Poro Point, consisting of 280,000 bags and a fourth vessel at a Vietnam port is loading 200,000 bags.

This boosted the stock of imported rice to 712,000 bags but still short by 1.3 million bags to fill the requirement of the region.—LM

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