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SEA
countries to raise rice stockpile
by Rocel
Felix, The Philippine Star
16-Oct-2002
Southeast
Asian countries have agreed to broadly increase the region's
strategic stockpile starting next year.
Philippine
Agriculture Secretary Leonardo Montemayor said the agreement was
reached by all the agriculture ministers from the 10-member
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), plus China, Japan and
South Korea who met for the annual agriculture and forestry
ministers' meeting last week in Vientiane, Laos.
"By 2003,
the rice reserves stockpiling scheme will be piloted. This will
determine which countries will provide the commodity and which
countries will avail of the reserves. The pilot project will also
determine how much fees will be paid by members to keep the system
going," said Montemayor.
Agriculture
ministers from ASEAN are still trying to work out proposals to raise
the rice reserves from the current 87,000 metric tons (MT) to as much
as 1.7 million MT.
The scheme
called ASEAN Emergency Rice Reserve (AERR) aims to increase food
security in the region as well as stabilize the price of the
commodity. ASEAN members can draw from the rice reserve in times of
disaster or crises.
Earlier,
National Food Authority Deputy Administrator Gregorio Tan Jr. said
some members of the ASEAN felt that a bigger volume is needed at this
time because of rising populations while the recurrence of El
Niño should further tighten supply of rice, a staple in the region.
ASEAN groups
Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines,
Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Thailand is
the world's top rice exporter, while Indonesia and the Philippines
are major rice importers.
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