Down with a cold. For the first time in months I did not exercise today. Apparently caught it from Imelda.
The rice shortage has contaminated other areas of commodity buying. The supermarkets are crowded with buyers stacking up with all types of essentials including soap.
So I have ordered the DND [Department of National Defense] to take over the situation. All rice and corn stocks should be taken over by the PC [Philippine Constabulary], hoarders, manipulators and blackmarketeers to be arrested.
We expect 15 million cavans of corn from the current harvest. We will buy about 8 million of this. And transport them to Manila immediately.
Beginning this week and we will start selling rice and corn mixes (50-50) in Manila.
Official Gazette for August 7, 1973: PERIOD from September, 1973 to February, 1974, is “Homecoming Season” for overseas Filipinos. The President issued Letter of Instructions No. 105 designating the six-month period as homecoming season for more than 700,000 overseas Filipinos. The Department of Tourism has been designated to coordinate the campaign which will be directed mainly at the United States and Europe. In this connection, a National Hospitality Committee, headed by the First Lady, will coordinate, organize and supervise a nationwide hospitality and reception program for the returning Filipinos.
SOME 77,574 farmers have joined some 1,504 barrio associations (samahangnayon) last July alone in the priority provinces chosen to implement the new cooperatives development program. This was reported to the President by Secretary Jose A. Roño of the Department of Local Governments and Community Development (DLGCD). This brings to 13,960 the total number of barrio associations organized during the past seven months. The total number of farmer-members now is 545,731. The six provinces with the most number of SamahangNayon as of July 1973 were: Iloilo-418; Nueva Ecija-262; Camarines Sur-254; Isabela-226; Albay-166; and Laguna-187.
THE PRESIDENT called on member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to maintain their internal strengths and stability before talking of cooperation or dealing with other regional groupings. The ASEAN is composed of the Philippines, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand. The President made this observation before the delegates to the two-day Ministers’ Conference held in Manila, when they paid their respects to him in Malacañang. He said that it was for this reason that his administration made it a prime concern to see that the government accurately speaks and reflects the sentiments of the people so that it can become an asset and not a liability to the ASEAN.
BUREAU of Customs circularized all brokerage firms doing business in the country to submit to the bureau copies of all bills issued to their customers in the exercise of the brokerage profession. The circular implements the new bureau policy of requiring weekly itemized and detailed statement of accounts being sent to importers,” including those made for tourists, transients, visitors, returning residents and persons coming in to settle down, in connection with the clearance and release of their respective importations or shipment of personal effects, as the case may be. Customs Commissioner Rolando G. Geotina, who signed the circular, warned brokerage firms that any charge against their clients on expenses classified as “invisibles” could result in the suspension of their operations and eventual cancellation of their brokerage licenses.
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