First, the Senate has no choice since the reduced tariff rates and the increased in-quota MAV have already taken effect.
Second, kung meron lang sanang nangyaring inter-departmental courtesy consultation, since EO 128 is a consequence of a delegated authority granted by Congress to the President anyway, we could have given our input based on our own consultations and research.
For example, the National Economic and Development Authority’s conclusion that demand for pork has not changed in spite of the pandemic is flawed. As I had pointed out during the Senate Committee of the Whole hearing, the 50% contraction registered by the hotel and restaurant operations should easily affect demand since the pre-pandemic 8.2 million foreign tourists are now eating pork somewhere else outside the country. Thus, at 15 kilograms of pork consumption per capita as estimated would mean 120 million kilograms less pork. That should be substantial enough to consider when they came up with the 350,000,000 kilograms in additional in-quota MAV allocation.
That being said, the appeal might as well be directed toward the 80,000 backyard hog raisers, their families, farm hands and all others now being affected by the EO, both directly and indirectly.
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