Not bothered by -38 rating? Arroyo inspects jathropa plantation in General Santos.
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P18.25 rice
rationed after August Poor families given until
end-July to get card
BY RANDY NOBLEZA
THE National Food Authority yesterday said it
is planning to pull out government-subsidized rice in public
markets in September when prices of the staple are expected to
soften because of the second cropping and harvest season.
The NFA is selling government-subsidized rice
at P18.25 a kilo. As part of the government's pro-poor programs,
poor families are being given access cards which will enable
them to buy the cheap rice.
"Low-priced rice should be allotted only for
the poor families with access cards," said Jessup Navarro, NFA
administrator.
MORE Filipino families reported experiencing
hunger during the second quarter of the year, a survey of the
Social Weather Stations showed.
Malacañang officials said this was a result
of increasing prices of fuel and food in the world market.
The SWS survey from June 27 to 30 showed that
families experiencing hunger rose to 16.3 percent (about 2.9
million families) in the second quarter as against the 15.7
percent who claimed to have experienced involuntary hunger in
the first quarter survey of March.
LINGAYEN-DAGUPAN Archbishop Oscar Cruz
yesterday said the rollback in diesel prices showed it is
feasible and calls for lower prices of fuel products are just
being ignored by the government and oil companies.
The oil firms implemented a P3 price hike on
diesel Saturday. The following day, Malacañang announced that
Petron Corp. and Pilipinas Shell, two of the Big 3 oil players,
had agreed to President Arroyo's request for a P1.50 rollback,
which took effect yesterday.
"This only shows that gas, oil and diesel
prices can and should be regulated just as salaries and other
prices," said Cruz, former president of the Catholic Bishops
Conference of the Philippines.
