The country desperately needs policies to support national food production, according to sector specialists and farmers, as the government's imposition of price controls has blatantly failed to deliver the desired results.
According to economist Olmedo Estrada, the food production chain is not been protected at present, causing market distortions.
A meeting of farmers, importers and distributors highlighted how there currently exists a shortage of onions across the country.
Faced with the current situation, key players across the food production chain demanded changes in the law, aimed at greater coordination of all local market participants. The aim would be to produce better forecast of future demand, avoid excessive imports by fine tuning local supply to market needs, thereby reducing speculation.
The president of the Association of Highland Producers, Augusto Gimenez, assured that the appropriate legal frameworks would ensure better coordination between supply and demand, leading to lower prices for consumers.
Mr. Gimenez advocated such laws as part of a series of initiatives in support of national agriculture.
In fact, it is not only onion farmers that are facing difficulties: rice producers compamined that rice imports spike precisely when the national production is at its highest.
Gabriel Arauz, President of the Association of Rice Producers of Chiriqui (Apach), has denounced that rice has already been imported into the country three times since August.
“It is important that the government introduce measures focused not just on a specific group, but across the board, with the aim of improving market participation and, consequently, efficiency”, declared Mr. Estrada.
What is clear is that the price control measures implemented by the government are the most palpable example of how impractical it is to try and control the prices of selected components of the basic basket of goods while leaving the rest unregulated, according to Mr. Estrada
Figures from the Authority for Consumer Protection and Fair Competition (Acodeco) highlighted how the price of meat, for instance, is out of control, showing increases as high as 40% in some cases.
Experts agree that price control measures have failed to produce results in any of the countries where there have been adopted. One of them, economist Irene Gimenez, declared that the data currently available made the policy failure “an irrefutable fact”.