Rice self-sufficiency ratio recovers to 78.5% in 2023

The country's rice self-sufficiency ratio (SSR) recovered to 78.5 percent last year, following a 24-year low of 77 percent in 2022, as a result of lower imports and higher domestic output.

- By JASPER EMMANUEL ARCALAS

Assistant National Statistician Rachel Lacsa disclosed the latest rice SSR figure during a recent hearing of the quinta committee of the House of Representatives, also known as the Murang Pagkain super committee.

The SSR measures the extent that the country's supply for a specific commodity or good comes from its own domestic production.

Lacsa pointed out that a lower SSR would mean that "domestic production is insufficient to meet total domestic needs."

"(It means that) 78.5 percent of total (rice) supply in 2023 came from domestic production and the other 21.5 percent came from rice imports," she said.

It was the third year in the past six years that the country's rice SSR was below 80 percent.

Government officials and industry stakeholders attributed the slight increase in rice SSR last year to higher rice production coupled by reduced import volume.