President Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr. is not keen on asking for "special powers" to curb inflation saying, his authority was sufficient enough to address it. "I do not think that it is necessary to ask for special powers. If we declare, for example, if we declare-- I already have the power to declare an emergency and to control the prices of commodities," Marcos said in an interview on the sidelines of the launch of Halina’t Magtanim ng Prutas At Gulay, Kadiwa’y Yaman, Plants for Bountiful Barangays Movement (Hapag Kay PBBM) at the Rizal Park in the City of Manila on Wednesday, March 1. "So I don't think there's any need for more than that. That is efficient," he added. The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has forecasted that February inflation rate could be at 8.5 to 9.3 percent. Marcos, however, said "we are more optimistic than the Central Bank" but did not discount the possibility of it rising further. The President said while the other elements of the inflation like prices of fuel is beyond the government's control, inflation on agricultural goods can be addressed, especially with the launch of barangay-based urban farming. He noted that inflation on agricultural products was cut down from 28 percent to 11 percent in January. "Wala tayong magagawa sa fuel. Wala tayong magagawa doon sa mga iba't ibang inputs, pero yung sa agrikultura— kung titingnan ninyo, you disaggregate the inflation figures, noong nakaraan, it was 28 percent was agriculture, eh. Ngayon 11 percent na lang so yun ang malaking bagay (We cannot do anything with fuel. We cannot do anything about the other inputs but in agriculture, if disaggregate the inflation figures, last time, it was 28 percent was agriculture. Now, it's only 11 percent so it's a big thing)," Marcos said. "The other elements of inflation hindi natin masyado ma-control. Kaya meron tayong ginagawang ganito para makabawi naman doon sa pagtaas ng presyo (we can no longer control. This is why we are implementing projects like this to address the high prices)," he added.