Discordant notes (2)

General Santos City—As we approach another year, we take stock of what has happened in the previous one. Last week, just before the year ended, I started this series of discordant notes that I observed in 2023, and considered that year to be a musical piece that jars, rather than soothes our ears.

Toward the end of December 2023, prices of rice soared to more than P50 per kilo, at least here in my city, prompting me to think that the reports from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) did not include monitoring rice prices beyond Metro Manila markets. Last Saturday, I noticed that the prices of rice in our local talipapa (wet markets) were in the P53-P65 range for a kilo of rice. The cheapest is the locally milled variety of what they call “160 local milled” and it costs P53 per kilo. The P48 per kilo price reported two weeks earlier by the PSA could not be seen in any market here.

But aside from rice, most basic commodities, including services have also increased by more than 10 percent from 2022. Being senior citizens, my husband and I need regular medical check-ups due to expected spikes in our blood pressure or blood sugar, aside from the usual knee and other joint pains that arise from wear and tear of our ligaments and other critical body parts. Early last year, I used to pay my doctor P500 as consultation fee, now it is a minimum of P600; some other medical specialists charge as high as P750 this year. Health has truly become a source of wealth—for doctors. But it is a source of headache for ordinary mortals like us and more so for daily wage earners who can’t even afford to have rice every day of their lives. Unlike doctors and other individuals with access to high-paying jobs, we are lacking in many respects, especially the needed wealth to keep ourselves hale and hearty every single day of our lives.

Governments exist to provide basic social services that promote the welfare and common good for the greater majority of people that they serve. But in 2023, among the years that passed, many Filipinos have felt the crunch of not being served well by the sitting government, especially at the national level. Among those who are reeling from the runaway prices of almost every item needed for basic survival are the disgruntled voters who got hooked on the election campaign promise of then-candidate Bongbong Marcos—that if elected president, he would make sure the prices of rice be kept at P20 per kilo levels. Why do many of us continue to vote for “promising” candidates—those who make the most promises but do not fulfill them?

A week ago, rice was again the main item in newscasts on national television. The government once again announced it is importing tons of rice to offset a possible shortage during the onset of the dry season or the drought due to El Niño.

This information did not bring pleasant vibes for many of us. Isn’t it that we are a rice-producing country and used to train representatives from other Asian countries, like Vietnam, on better and more profitable ways of rice cultivation? We have succeeded in this regard—Vietnam is now the Philippines’ number one source of our imported rice. Does this not disturb us, knowing our former status as a hub of learning rice cultivation, and now among the world’s leading importer of rice? And what has happened to earlier government assurances of having an ample supply of rice during the last months of 2023, after a good harvest in the last quarter of the year?

As ordinary people like us are feeling the pinch of what it is to be financially deprived last year, and probably in the coming years, the news of the passage of this year’s humongous budget of almost P6 trillion or about $102 billion once again disturbed us.

National economists claim this budget will “future-proof” our economy, but given that the 2024 budget amount is based more on projected government revenues within the year, it is still risky, as many critics have voiced out during the deliberations. Economic projections are just that—they are projections and are highly dependent on the volatile political and economic contexts the country will face in 2024. Economic experts still consider that a deficit of more than P1 trillion in the approved budget raises the risks of further increasing it when inflation continues to ravage our national economy.

All these, topped by the worst international tragedy to have happened in modern times—the relentless acts of impunity by the government of Israel in Gaza that have killed more than 20,000 Palestinians—have made living in 2023 a difficult one not only for us but for the global community as well.

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