CEBU CITY – Retailers here are feeling the pinch of the rice price cap.

UNDERSECRETARY Terence Calatrava (second from left) of the Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas inspects prices of rice at Carbon Market in Cebu City on Thursday, Sept. 14. (Photo from Radyo Pilipinas Cebu)
But Erwin Goc-ong Jr. said they have no choice but to follow the price cap but they are hoping that the price ceiling will be lifted soon by the government.
“We have no choice but to follow or we get penalized by DTI (Department of Trade and Industry),” Goc-ong said in Cebuano.
Goc-ong was one of the eight rice retailers at the Carbon Market who each received P15,000 during the cash assistance payout conducted by the Department of Welfare and Social Development-Central Visayas (DSWD-7) on Thursday morning, September 14.
He said they have incurred losses when President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. issued Executive Order No. 39 mandating the price ceiling for regular and well-milled rice at P41 and P45, respectively.
He said they are buying regular and well-milled rice from Vietnam at P50 per kilo.
“We hope that the price of rice will stop increasing because it really affects the poor. Even if we raise the price of rice for just P1, they will really complain. They are looking for that P20 per kilo that was promised,” said Goc-ong, who has been a rice retailer since 1998.
Prior to the distribution of cash assistance, authorities inspected rice prices at Carbon Market.
Undersecretary Terence Calatrava of the Office of the Presidential Assistant for the Visayas led the inspection of rice stalls at Carbon Market and in public markets in the cities of Mandaue and Lapu-Lapu.
“We are here to monitor and implement the Executive Order No. 39 of President Bongbong Marcos Jr. on the price cap of rice," Calatrava said.
Calatrava said they found no violators of the price cap during the inspection. He afterwards flew to Dumaguete City for the distribution of cash assistance.
According to DSWD-7, a total of 89 rice retailers in Central Visayas will each receive a one-time cash assistance of P15,000.