The Department of Agriculture (DA) said the National Food Authority (NFA) will need about P500 million to P1 billion in additional funding to be able to buy corn from local growers in 2026.
The NFA will focus its procurement program on white corn, the top substitute or replacement for rice in many areas of the country, Agriculture Secretary Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr. said in a briefing with reporters on Tuesday.
Tiu Laurel is the concurrent chair of the NFA council.
“That is planned to be implemented by 2026. What we plan is more for buying white corn and, of course, a little bit of yellow corn as well. Why white corn? Because it’s for food, and it can be made into corn grits as a substitute, replacement or alternative for rice, and we still have a lot of areas in the Philippines which really consume corn grits,” he explained.
Tiu Laurel added that promoting white corn can help lower the country’s demand for rice.
“For the budget, we already requested it” under the General Appropriations Act (GAA) for 2026. “Hopefully, we can be provided even with a little, just to start the ball rolling,” he added.
The DA chief emphasized that the NFA will use its 134 refurbished warehouses in buying both palay and corn from local farmers.
On Monday, June 30, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and the NFA announced that the government will start buying corn from local farmers, in addition to rice, in 2026.
The NFA said it is likely to do a pilot run in select areas first, as the agency had long been without a corn procurement activity. The NFA said that for decades, it has been focused on its mandate to maintain a sufficient national buffer stock of rice, equivalent to 15 days, by buying palay from the local farmers as required by the law.
Local farm groups welcomed the idea of the NFA buying corn from local growers. But they urged the government to ensure enough funding to make it work as a market intervention to stabilize prices and give local farmers fair return to their produce.
Leonardo Montemayor, the Federation of Free Farmers chairman, said that “any form of marketing assistance for farmers, whether rice or corn, would be welcome, especially during times when farmgate prices are very low.”
However, he noted that “the impact of the support will depend on the level of funding and availability of post-harvest facilities, especially since this might compete with the funding and logistical needs for the NFA’s rice procurement programs.”
Jayson Cainglet, executive director of the Samahang Industriya ng Agrikultura (SINAG), said that similar to the case of the NFA’s palay procurement, a bigger concern would be the government’s capacity “to effectively intervene with the market.”
“We laud the efforts of the DA and NFA to procure as much palay and corn as possible. For palay, they have exceeded the target procurement but it is not even close to 5 percent of the total palay harvest. The DA needs a budget of P40 billion in palay procurement for effective market intervention,” Cainglet said.
For corn, Cainglet said, NFA will need a budget equivalent to at least 5 percent of the total corn production, but he did not provide specific amounts.
Cainglet added that rice farmers have been seeking more farm input subsidies and cash incentives at this time, as the availability or lack of government aid will influence their decision to plant palay or forego planting this cropping season.
