Department of Agriculture, hog growers reach compromise

MANILA, Philippines - The Department of Agriculture (DA) will be given access to the inward foreign manifest (IFM) as a form of compromise between the government and hog raisers seeking increased protection from the proliferation of smuggled meat and meat products in the country.

Agriculture Secretary Proceso Alcala said a quarantine officer from the DA and not from the private sector would be given access to the IFM to ensure the quality and legality of meat shipments into the country.

Aside from meat shipments, the DA would be given access to cargo records of all agricultural products beginning July.

The Department of Finance, which has jurisdiction over the Bureau of Customs (BOC) had earlier rejected the appeal of hog raiser group Alyansa Agrikultura to be given access to the IFM which contains details of all cargoes.

The group earlier said that the market was being swamped by smuggled meat and meat products because of BOC’s inability to prevent smuggling of these products into the country.

In a letter to Alcala dated June 5, Finance Undersecretary and officer-in-charge John Philip Sevilla said the IFM contains critical trade information which, if made public, could “destroy fair competition and encourage unscrupulous business practices.”

“IFM data have strategic value in international trade negotiations because it enables potential trading partners to study the country’s import profile; therefore, such data must be carefully regulated and must not be readily available,” Sevilla’s letter said.

“Considering the foregoing we cannot approve the automatic transmittal of the IFM to the DA unless the above-mentioned security concerns are sufficiently addressed,” the letter further stated.

The DOF said that instead of giving hog raisers access to the IFM, there would be a thorough inspection of all meat and meat imports covered by a five percent to 10 percent tariff.

The BOC would also make changes in the reference prices of pork and chicken meat to reflect realistic market prices, and that quarantine inspection would be done prior to the collection of duties and taxes.