BY GILBERT P. BAYORAN
Negros Occidental 5th District Representative-elect Emilio “Dino” Yulo yesterday said that he will push for a Negrense to head the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA).
The term of SRA chief Hermenegildo Serafica is expected to end on June 30, as President Rodrigo Duterte steps down from office to pave the way for the incoming administration under the leadership of presumptive President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Yulo, a former SRA head, who took his oath as member of the House of Representative before Gov. Eugenio Jose Lacson, yesterday said that 66 percent, or two thirds of the sugar produced in the country comes from Negros.
“It is important, in the sense that, if you a Negrense, you get to feel of the overall situation,” Yulo said.
Serafica earned the ire of sugar planters and other stakeholders of the industry for steadily pushing for sugar importation despite preliminary injunctions issued against it by two regional trial courts in Negros Occidental.
The sugar importation also came during the peak of milling season, which according to sugar farmers “will have a disastrous effect in the sugar industry, particularly among the small sugar producers,” who are grappling with the high cost of fertilizers.
Yulo said that the sugar industry has lot of stakeholders, not only sugar planters, but millers and laborers, as well, with majority of them in the province.
Since the SRA administrator Serafica is not here, “he did not get the sentiments of Negrenses.”
Gov Eugenio Jose Lacson earlier pushed for a Negrense to head the SRA, with the term of Serafica ending on June 30, when President Rodrigo Duterte steps down from office.
Yulo said he will leave it to the wisdom of the appointing authority, Presumptive President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., on whom he will designate as SRA head.*
