Phl eyes $1-B loan for grains modernization
The government is looking at a $1 billion-loan from a Dubai-based company for the construction of grain silos throughout the country in a bid to modernize the rice industry.
The Department of Agriculture recently met with B2Firms DMCC for a possible 10-year loan of $1 billion for the design and construction of 20 grain silos and other post-harvest facilities in five major rice production areas in the country.
“The National Food Authority Council referred it to the NFA for technical review and whatever the recommendation of the NFA technical team will be reviewed by the council, and if it is favorable then we will endorse it to the NEDA-ICC [National Economic and Development AuthorityInvestment Coordination Committee],” Agriculture chief Emmanuel Piñol said.
“We are in the process of really modernizing our grains facilities from postharvest to storage and marketing. This would fit well in the program of the NFA to focus more on local procurement and leave the private sector to import the bulk of the imported rice needed in the market,” he added.
If favorably endorsed by NFA’s technical team, Piñol aims to submit the proposal to the NEDA-ICC before the end of the year.
The government plans to build four silos in each of the five sites to be selected in Central Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao.
“I feel that this is where our grains industry is very weak. Right now, NFA is still using the old storage method of dilapidated warehouses where the stocks are ‘first in, last out’ because you pile it up,” Piñol said.
“This silos system will have the first in, first out system where the palay deposited will go through an automatic drying facility and stored in silos capable of storing up to 60,000 metric tons of paddy rice and whatever is stored first will be the first to come out,” he added.
B2Firms DMCC is a consulting company highly specialized in financing, agriculture projects, infrastructure and problem solving solutions for government or big organizations and companies.