The House of Representatives Committee on Agriculture on Tuesday approved the proposed amendments to the Rice Tariffication Law (RTL) in a bid to bring down rice prices.
The committee’s approval came after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. announced he was prepared to certify the amendment proposals as urgent.
Speaker Ferdinand Martin G. Romualdez has since thanked the committee for approving the measure.
The panel’s chairperson, Quezon Rep. Mark Enverga, told reporters that the approved measure “will ensure that there will be the presence of NFA to stabilize the price of rice.”
He said NFA should always be ready to intervene in the market to bring down prices especially in emergency cases, noting it is important that local price coordinating councils and the National Price Coordinating Council monitor prices and coordinate NFA’s market intervention.
However, Enverga said the approved bill would still have to go through the Committee on Ways and Means “the soonest possible.”
For his part, Deputy Majority Leader for Communications and ACT-CIS party-list Rep. Erwin Tulfo said House efforts to bring down rice prices could get derailed in the Senate.
“We’re facing another uphill battle here. It was passed at the House already. Our problem now is the Senate. The Senate has a different version, and we think it does not make sense to us. So, even if the bill is passed here, it seems a futile exercise,” Tulfo said in a mix of English and Filipino.
He asked the Senate to simply adopt the House version of the RTL amendments.
Furthermore, Tulfo pointed out time is running out on the approval of the proposed RTL changes, particularly by the Senate, with Congress going on its sine die adjournment in less than three weeks.
