- BERT BAYORAN
The scrapping of Sugar Order No. 4 that allows the importation of 300,000 metric tons of sugar by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who is the concurrent Agriculture secretary, was hailed by the Asociacion de Agricultores de La Carlota y Pontevedra Inc. (AALCPI), the La Carlota Mill District Multi-Purpose Cooperative (LCMDMPC), and the United Sugar Producers Federation (UNIFED).
“With the start of the milling season, the need to import additional sugar is ill advised,” said AACLPI and LCMDMPC general manager David Alba.
“We are thankful that President Marcos vetoed the order since five mills in Negros Occidental already resumed operations,” Alba said in a statement.
He also said that data from the Sugar Regulatory Administration showed that there are four million bags of sugar that entered the country through the SO 3 importation program.
“However, this sugar is not being made available to Juan De La Cruz since they are in the bodegas of the industrial users, the sector that is obviously given preferential treatment by SRA Administrator Hermenegildo Serafica,” Alba said.
Thus, in order to address the perceived sugar supply shortage in the country, we are recommending to President Marcos to reverse the SRA order and instead, release this sugar for the benefit of the consumers and retailers, he added.
In a separate statement, UNIFED president Manuel Lamata also thanked the President for revoking SO 4 and joined the call issued by Senator Imee Marcos to “revamp” the Department of Agriculture and the SRA, amid the investigation into the alleged illegality of the recent sugar order.
“We are joining the call of Sen. Marcos because it is very apparent already that these officials are not looking out for the interest of the industry,” said Lamata.
The fact that SO 4 included the importation of raw sugar when milling season has already started “indicates that these people governing the very agency that is supposed to protect us, are actually out to destroy us,” Lamata added./GB
