BOCAUE, Bulacan—After palay prices reached a new high, hitting P17 a kilo early inSeptember, it started to drop after the first week of September as the harvest season started and hit P11 a kilo some 10 days ago.

But Mavic Recella, a rice miller at Intercity Industrial Estate in this town, a major rice trading center of the country, told BusinessMirror that palay prices started to rise again right after the explosion that rocked the Glorietta 2 mall in Makati on October 19.

Ato Omnes, a palay classifier at Intercity Industrial Estate, confirmed Recella’s observation and said that current palay prices have risen from P11.70 to P13.20 a kilo.

Recella explained that palay prices at P17 per kilo early last month would translate to a wholesale rice price of at least P1,300 per sack, or at least P26 per kilo.

When it hit the P11-per-kilo mark, Recella said that wholesale rice price slid to around P875 per sack, or at least P17.50 per kilo.

After the Makati  blast on October 19, Recella that palay prices started to soar from  P11.70 to P13.20 a kilo, which translates to a wholesale price of rice from at least P930 per sack or P18.55 per kilo, to P1,050 per sack or at least P21 per kilo depending on the quality and variety of the palay.

Omnes, on the other hand, said palay traders said the rise in palay prices is not related to the Makati  blast but rather to the palay stockpiling being made by rice traders.

Many rice traders, Omnes said, have started to field in rice-producing provinces their own palay agents to buy newly harvested grains by outbidding their competitors by raising their farm-gate palay buying price.

The rice traders at Intercity said many rain-fed areas in palay-producing provinces have experienced late planting this rainy season because of the prolonged dry spell that spilt over into the third quarter of this year.

But as the rains started due to the entry of typhoons Chedeng and Dodong, most of the rice planted in irrigated areas at the time were badly affected and destroyed by the floods spawned by the weather disturbances.

As a result, most of the rice-producing provinces were forced to restart their planting season in September, which is expected to force the palay harvest season to be extended until December, Omnes said.

Recella said that the delayed planting season also resulted in a big reduction in harvested grains usually experienced starting in the months of September till November and trickling down to December, and starts again by the month of March for the dry-season harvest period.

This may also explain why palay prices have started to increase this early as high demand for palay procurements by rice traders pushed the golden grain’s prices to soar, Omnes and Recella said.

Ed Camua, information officer of the National Food Authority in Bulacan, earlier assured consumers that there are enough rice stocks to tide the country over till the month of December.

Camua also said their rice stocks are available at their accredited retail outlet stores at P18 a kilo.

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BOCAUE, Bulacan—After palay prices reached a new high, hitting P17 a kilo early inSeptember, it started to drop after the first week of September as the harvest season started and hit P11 a kilo some 10 days ago.