Time to take stock and prepare

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With the situation in the Middle East showing no signs of de-escalating, and is in fact increasingly moving toward a more prolonged conflict as Iran becomes more determined to draw in more countries by restricting the vital movement of oil resources through the critical Strait of Hormuz – warning that it will drive up prices to a dangerously high $200 per barrel level – countries like us must prepare to hunker down and survive this crisis.

It would do well for us Filipinos to take stock of our financial resources and prepare for a series of price shocks that are sure to come with crude oil prices continuing to rise.

While there are reports that some global oil reserves are set to be released to offset the sudden surge in oil prices, Filipinos should not be lured into thinking that the Philippines can easily tap that supply as we face competition from much larger nations.

According to government pronouncements, our own oil stocks are sufficient up to April this year or roughly 45 days. However, the summer season is starting and with the effect of climate change, our summers have gotten hotter.

Government, fortunately, has already ordered the implementation of a four-day work week to lessen government use of electricity. That means that electricity consumption will shift to households and most likely to commercial establishments as longer weekends will allow more people to flock to shopping malls and commercial centers.

Thus, the burden of expenses will shift to households that have increasingly become dependent on having food delivered or eating out.

Food deliveries may be convenient, but economically are more expensive as the price of the food is almost double due to the cost of delivery. More likely, the food delivery business may also be negatively affected by the four-day work week as more people will be able to go to the market on the extra day off and go back to cooking their meals at home.

Similarly, office workers will more likely eat at home, and restaurants, carinderias and fast-food outlets that normally enjoy brisk business from office workers would experience a drop in sales – an unwanted knock-on effect on the economy.

The summer season, when travel usually picks up – either domestically or abroad – will also be affected. In fact, the Middle East conflict has already significantly affected global travel because most of the airlines that operate heavily rely on major hubs in the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Kuwait have been the target of Iran’s retaliation against attacks initiated by Israel and the United States.

Thankfully, we are part of the Asian region where there has been relative stability, and thus, regional travel still remains robust or, in fact, may gain from US and European travelers who are still traveling.

Local tourism, for us, may also be affected due to the higher cost of jet fuel that will result in a rise in domestic airfares.

Similarly, land travel will also be curtailed to some degree with the higher cost of fuel, with gasoline prices now going past P70 per liter and diesel prices past P80 per liter. Of course, higher fuel prices, plus toll and higher food and accommodation.

Perhaps, pretty much like the COVID pandemic, more people will opt to stay home and binge watch their favorite shows on Netflix, HBO or other paid streaming services.

Likewise, the younger generation will likely rely on their default social tool, the internet through Viber, Reddit, TikTok to remain in touch while comfortably reclined on their bed, in the comfort of their home.

But knowing the entrepreneurial spirit of Filipino households, it is likely that new home food businesses will once again flourish, as it should, with the expected higher cost of food products.

Perhaps the government, or to be more specific, the Department of Agriculture and the local government units should exert more effort into putting up more community wet/fresh markets in Mega Manila. As it is right now, the default “markets” are supermarkets where the produce are not as fresh and cost twice as much as wet markets.

Problem is, because of our overcrowded cities, it is difficult to find a good size community wet/fresh market.

What is normally available are small, makeshift talipapas that are difficult to access unless it is walking distance from your residence.

Again for an agricultural producing country like us, the government does not seem to see the value or the practicality of having a good network of wet/fresh markets in city centers that could help alleviate the cost of living crisis.

In European countries, their wet/fresh markets are even a tourist attraction.

I belong to that generation that used to go to market daily to buy fresh fish – and a wide variety of them, which unfortunately nowadays is rare to find except in the provinces. What is available in abundance even in local supermarkets are foreign-farm grown fish such as salmon, locally-farmed tilapia or Nile fish, imported seabass and an assortment of frozen fish like halibut or sole. Even our own locally available lapu-lapu in now hard to find as most of the big fancy restaurants have first dibs on the big fish.

There was a wide assortment of vegetables compared to what we now regularly rely on, which is the “pakbet” vegetables that include eggplants, okra, kalabasa and ampalaya, and the western favorites of carrots, cabbage and potatoes.

In the past, I used to buy an assortment of freshly shucked beans – the names of which I now forget – that are no longer available or are hard to find. Ilocano vegetables like alucon are now rare in Manila, but are still perhaps available in the Ilocos region.

So, here we are, facing the consequences of a war that should not have been undertaken, and in the end, we only have ourselves to rely on.