DA eyes revising 30-year-old pork importation rules

The Department of Agriculture (DA) is planning to overhaul the three-decade-old rules governing the importation of pork at lower tariffs, citing alleged exploitation by importers.

In a statement on Wednesday, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said he is directing a total overhaul of the minimum access volume (MAV) mechanism for pork, which was formulated nearly 30 years ago.

MAV refers to the quantity of a given imported agricultural product that the Philippine government allows entry into the country at a lower tariff rate.

“We are reformulating the rules for MAV. The DA’s Policy and Planning Office is already on the job and they have to have an output by October this year,” Tiu Laurel said.

“Our MAV rules were written in 1996 and when I read it, I found a lot of room for improvement. So, we have to revise the MAV,” he said.

Pork imported under the MAV quota have a lower tariff of 15% compared to the regular rate of 25%.

The MAV allocation for imported pork was at a total 55,000 metric tons —30,000 MT of which was set aside for meat processors to ensure lower-priced processed meat.

In reviewing the MAV scheme, Tiu Laurel said he found out that of the 130 quota holders, 47 account for 80% of the total allocation while 22 out of 47 have cornered 70% of that volume.

“In reality, 22 MAV quota holders account for 55% of the total volume,” the Agriculture chief said.

“Worse… many of those MAV quota are often reused, inflating total import volume,” he said, adding that “the sad part about this is that consumers don’t benefit the reduced tariff.”

Tiu Laurel said the DA is initially planning to increase allocation to meat processors to 40,000 MT and the balance to be set aside for the Food Terminals Inc. to allow it to have the resources to intervene in the market to stabilize pork prices.

To tame prices of pork at the retail level, the DA has implemented a maximum suggested retail price on pork (MSRP) —P380 per kilo of liempo and P350 a kilo of pigue and kasim. Meanwhile, the MSRP for fresh carcass or "sabit ulo" was fixed at P300 per kilo. —VAL, GMA Integrated News