Farmers are supporting a petition pending at the Tariff Commission seeking to revert the most favored nation (MFN) import tariff on rice to 35 percent from 15 percent stressing the tariff cut failed to serve its purpose.
The Commission conducted a hearing today, March 28, 2025, on the petition by SINAG (Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura) to restore the original MFN rice tariff.
At the hearing, Raul Q. Montemayor, National Manager of the Federation of Free Farmers (FFF), submitted their position to bolster the petition of SINAG.
“Revert MFN tariff to 35% for non-premium rice imports and set MFN tariffs for premium rice from non-ASEAN countries (Basmati, Japonica, etc) to 50% or higher,” the FFF said in its position letter.
Montemayor summarized the reasons for their support to SINAG’s petition: the MFN tariff cut from 35% to 15% did not work; most traders and intermediaries are the only ones benefitting from the tariff reduction; and rice prices did not drop as envisioned.
To protect consumers, FFF proposed that National Food Authority and Department of Agriculture sell rice at prices near true market value instead of at artificially low levels in order to pull down commercial prices.
The farmers also urged for the development of electronic and online marketing systems that can provide alternative sources for buyers.
Also, FFF urged for aggressive implementation of measures to address hoarding, profiteering and cornering of imports.
To protect farmers, the farmers’ group has proposed the imposition of special and general safeguard duties to address import surges, market gluts, and depressed palay price and the seasonal tariffs for harvest season and lean months.
The farmers would also like the government to consider a supply management system wherein an MFN rate is raised to high level to discourage MFN imports.
This system should also allow for MAV tariff to be set lower than MFN and ATIGA tariff to encourage imports under the minimum access volume.
