THE PHILIPPINES is one of the top destinations for exported wheat, soybean cake and meal for market year (MY) 2019/2020, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) said in a report.
In its export sales report for the week ending June 13, the USDA noted that exported wheat to the Philippines for the next MY will be at 65,900 metric tons (MT). The country is second to Indonesia with 84,500 MT.
As for soybean cake and meal, the country is the top destination with 55,300 MT, followed by Mexico with 21,900 MT.
In a separate report, the agency said the importation of agricultural commodities like wheat, corn, and rice has helped ease inflation.
“Philippine inflation continued to decline in 2019, mainly because of considerable food and feed grain imports. Although inflation slightly increased to 3.2 percent in May 2019 due to food price adjustments brought about by a mild El Niño, Philippine government planners expect full year inflation to settle within the 2-4 percent target for 2019,” it said.
After peaking at 6.7% in September to October in 2018, inflation eased to 6% in November and 5.1% in December with the arrival of food and feed grain imports.
It further declined to 4.4% in January, 3.8% in February, 3.3% in March, and 3% in April before inching up to 3.2% in May.
The Philippine Statistics Authority said wheat imports in the first quarter grew 21.6% to $543.58 million; corn imports declined 45.7% to $43.09 million; and rice imports increased 165.3% to $473.47 million.
The government has implemented the Rice Tariffication law to help the rice industry by removing quantitative restrictions to imported rice and replacing it with tariffs, which will be used to improve rice production.
The USDA recently noted that the Southeast Asia is expected to be the top wheat importing region in 2018/2019 driven by demand from Philippines, due to typhoons, and Indonesia due to higher food and feed demand. — Vincent Mariel P. Galang
