Ang dahilan kung bakit mas mahal ang lokal na produktong pagkain sa merkado kumpara sa imported ay ang ating flawed marketing system where from the farm gate to the kitchen of the Filipino families, the goods pass through 6 to 10 traders and middlemen.
The “multiple passing” of farm products is mainly because our country is geographically fragmented where in transporting goods from one island to another takes a lot of expense.
Not many people know this, but it is more expensive to transport bananas from Mindanao to Metro Manila than to ship the same from Davao to Japan.
There is really a need for government to provide logistical and marketing support to our food producers to ensure that goods are moved efficiently and with less expenses.
One of the legislative advocacies which I will carry with me to the Senate is the reactivation and funding of the moribund Food Terminal Inc. to establish food consolidation and distribution centers.
The FTI is an existing government corporation under the National Food Authority which was established in 1968 to handle food processing and distribution.
For years, it operated the FTI Food Distribution Center in Taguig with the goods coming from the nearby provinces for the Metro Manila consumers.
Just like many Marcos Era programs, the FTI was deactivated following the change of political leadership in 1986 and a huge part of its over 100-hectare property in Taguig was sold by government to Ayala Corp.
The FTI could be expanded and funded properly so that it could open Food Consolidation Centers in the key food production areas of the country to buy farmers and fishermen’s produce.
With the needed storage and logistics facilities, these goods could moved to the big cities and sold in Farmers and Fishermen’s Outlets where consumers or small vendors in community markets could directly buy.
The institutional infrastructure is already existing and all that is needed is to amend the law which created FTI to expand its operations with the needed funding support.
Kapag nagawsa ito, maiiwasan na ang maraming kamay na dinadaanan ng ating mga produktong pagkain from the farm to the kitchen.
The end result would be fresher food commodities whose prices could be competitive to imported or smuggled vegetables or goods.
There will be available and affordable food while at the same time the income of food producers would increase and jobs would be created.
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