President Rodrigo Duterte’s recommendation to increase the minimum access volume (MAV) for pork and his proposal to lower the tariffs for imported pork could spell doom for the local hog industry, Senator Francis “Kiko” Pangilinan said on Wednesday, April 7.

Pangilinan said that is why he is appealing to the President to heed the call of stakeholders in the local swine industry to review his directive.

“This will kill the hog industry,” Pangilinan said in a text message.

Last March, Duterte recommended increasing the MAV for pork by 350,000 metric tons to augment the supply in the local market after the hog industry was hit by the African swine fever (ASF).

This will augment the current MAV of 54,210 MT for the year 2021.

But Pangilinan said local hog raisers did not expect this move from the President.

“This was not the appeal of a dying local hog industry. This would actually be more cumbersome for them while importers will get to earn in billions from this directive,” he warned.

Pangilinan also said the government should have prioritized the declaration of a state of calamity so hog raisers can overcome the severe impact of the ASF to the local swine industry through the funds that would be made available once it is approved.

The Senate earlier adopted Senate Resolution No. 676 which if approved by the President will allow the Department of Agriculture (DA) to tap the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Fund (NDRRMF) and the Quick Response Fund (QRF) to supplement the government’s efforts to contain the ASF.

“Aside from additional ‘ayuda’ (financial assistance), I hope they (government) prioritized the declaration of the state of calamity),” he said.

Sen. Cynthia Villar, chair of the Senate Committee on Food and Agriculture, had earlier scored the DA for recommending to lower the tariff on imported pork, which she also said will kill the local hog industry.

Villar also criticized the advisory council that pushed to increase the MAV on imported pork to address the supply shortage.

“You don’t kill your own local industry because that is the long-term of the Philippines. This one is just short-term…but if you impose this for a year, you will kill the industry and it might never recover,” Villar told DA officials during a Senate hearing last month.

“This is the first time I’ve seen a DA that does not love its own local industry,” she also said.