THE National Food Authority (NFA) is filing administrative charges against 25 grains traders after they were found diverting NFA rice, operating without license and overpricing.

The traders were apprehended as part of the agency’s drive to ensure the effective distribution of rice and prevent price speculation due to perceptions of a rice shortage caused by the dry spell.

NFA said its personnel netted the erring traders during their monitoring of rice supply and prices in various markets. The agency, however, did not identify the erring grains businessmen.

At least 84 NFA personnel are deployed daily in 113 markets in Metro Manila and Cavite.  The teams monitor 1,044 rice outlets including 190 Bigasan ni Gloria sa Palengke (BGP), 289 accredited individual retailers and 565 commercial rice outlets.

Upon apprehension, the rice allocation of erring grains businessmen were immediately suspended pending the formal filing of charges.

The NFA said it has already apprehended close to 1,100 erring grains businessmen nationwide as a result of its intensive market surveillance for the past weeks.

Meanwhile, the NFA said the prices of commercial rice were monitored to be going down due to harvest in the  Visayas and Mindanao as well as the NFA’s intensified distribution and monitoring activities. Based on its monitor, NFA rice remains at P18 per kilogram.

The agency has earlier declared that it will increase by half the volume of government rice it distributes in Metro Manila  and nearby Regions III (Central Luzon) and IV (Southern Tagalog).

AFTER securing a certification from the Office of the Government Corporate Counsel (OGCC) that it is already a privately owned company, the Philippine National Oil Co.-Energy Development Corp. (PNOC-EDC) is looking at helping the government achieve its privatization efforts, particularly in the power sector, Paul A. Aquino, the company president told the BusinessMirror Tuesday.

CEBU CITY—Real-estate and construction leaders in the country are looking to tap more the foreign-based market to bring in more fresh money and keep the current heyday of the land sector going.

DAVAO CITY—President Arroyo signed here Tuesday an executive order (EO) inviting factories and other heavy-power users to put up their operations around the cheaper-rated geothermal power plants, including the one in environmentally sensitive Mt. Apo.

AFTER two years, government units banded under the Philippine Antipiracy Team (PAPT) remains reactive to the trade in bootleg copies of computer software, video and audio media.

THE Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) on Tuesday lauded the efforts of local government units (LGUs) in carrying out massive relief and rehabilitation to cushion the impact of the dry spell in Luzon.

THE National Food Authority (NFA) is filing administrative charges against 25 grains traders after they were found diverting NFA rice, operating without license and overpricing.

THE Cebu City government is scheduling to bid out 30 hectares of its prime 240-hectare reclaimed South Road Properties (SRP) by the end of the year to raise money for the cash-strapped city.