The government tripled the supply of the PhP29 per kilo of rice for the poor and vulnerable households in Kadiwa stores, an official of the National Food Authority (NFA) said.
In a press briefing in Malacañang on Tuesday, NFA Administrator Larry Lacson said Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. recently ordered to increase the availability of the PhP29/kilo of rice from 10 kilos to 30 kilos maximum that can be bought by each poor and vulnerable household per month.
The Department of Agriculture (DA) also broadened the reach of its PhP29/kilo rice program by adding more Kadiwa stores nationwide, Lacson said.
The DA last year launched a large-scale trial of the PhP29 rice program, an initiative spearheaded by President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. aimed at providing high-quality rice at PhP29 per kilo to as many as 6.9 million “vulnerable households,” representing around 35 million Filipinos.
A total of 10 Kadiwa stores in Metro Manila and Bulacan started to sell the low-priced rice in the trial program and now expanding to other Kadiwa outlets.
The PhP29 per kilo rice is sourced from ageing stocks of the NFA to be sold to the vulnerable households, which the DA described as beneficiaries of the government’s Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps), solo parents, senior citizens, persons with disabilities, and indigenous people.
The 4Ps program is a human development measure of the national government that provides conditional cash grants to the poorest of the poor, to improve the health, nutrition, and the education of children aged 0-18 , the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) said.
Meanwhile, the government has also started selling PhP33 rice to Kadiwa stores in resettlement sites for public housing beneficiaries as part of the government’s program to ensure food security.
The government has been putting up Kadiwa stores that sell PhP33 per kilo of rice in housing sites of the National Housing Authority (NHA) starting this April, General Manager Joeben Tai said in a statement.
Tai said more Kadiwa stores will open in different areas from this month to May 2025. | PND
