I stumbled upon an informative article, from the Price of Rice, a GMANews.tv Microsite, while trying to make myself busy. It’s about figures and informations about Rice in the Philippines. Who would’ve expected the figures would be that high. With the Rice "Crisis" that the Philippines is currently under, this information would give us insights on how it came about and hopefully how we could overcome it. My question would be, "Are the reasons and solutions, given by our current government, enough to ease the people and not make them worry anymore about the current "Rice Crisis" that we are experiencing?"
Estimated amount of rice to be imported by the Philippines this year according to a March report: 2.2 million metric tons
Estimated amount of rice imported by the Philippines in 2007: 1.87 million metric tons
Amount of rice imported by the Philippines in 1990: .593 million metric tons
Number of sacks of rice Filipinos waste daily, according to a study made by the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics and the Food and Nutrition Research Institute: 24,805 sacks/day
Estimated amount of wasted rice: 22 million pesos
Number of spoonfuls of rice each Filipino wastes everyday: 1 spoonful/day
Number of days the wasted rice can feed the Filipino population: 14 days
Number of sacks of rice Filipinos consume daily: 646,000 sacks/day
Number that the Philippines consumes daily: 32 in thousand metric tons
Estimated amount of rice that the Department of Agriculture expects to produce for this year: 17.32 million metric tons
Amount of rice produced in 2007 under the government’s Ginintuang Masaganang Ani program: 16.24 million metric tons
Total effective area of rice plantations under the aforementioned program: 4.27 million hectares
Amount of rice produced in 2006 under the government’s Ginintuang Masaganang Ani program: 15.33 million metric tons
Number of months it took the Department of Agriculture to increase rice productivity targets for 2007 under the government’s Accelerated Hunger Mitigation Program: 10 months
Number of years starting 2008 until the Philippines attains 95 percent rice self-sufficiency, according to the Department of Agriculture: 2 years
Number of days worth of rice inventories that the National Food Authority should keep in stock on the average: 15 days
Number of days worth of rice inventories that the National Food Authority has in stock, according to a March report: 13 days
Estimated amount of rice pledged by Asean countries, including Japan, South Korea, and China for the East Asian Emergency Rice Reserve, which intends to stabilize grain prices: 200 thousand metric tons
Amount of rice that the Philippines may use from the aforementioned reserve according to a March report: 25 to 40 thousands of tons
Amount of palay harvests that the government expects this year as per a March report: 17.33 million metric tons
Amount of palay harvests last year: 15.33 million metric tons
Amount of subsidized rice of the total volume sold in the Philippines: 16
Amount of money released by the government to ensure food production, just for the month of March alone: 3.35 billion pesos
Number of times that the Philippines drew from the Asean’s emergency rice reserves: 1
Estimated percentage of imported rice stocks held by the National Food Authority, according to the Bureau of Agricultural Statistics: 89%
Original Article written by ROBERT JA BASILIO JR. for GMANews.TV http://www.gmanews.tv/story/88506/Facts-and-Figures-on-Rice
