Republic Act No. 1345

Also known as: RA 1345 — the docket styling · The NAMARCO charter — the styling fixed by the corporation it created · An Act Creating the National Marketing Corporation and Dissolving the Price Stabilization Corporation — the long-title styling

Government

Definition

Republic Act No. 1345 is the statute — “AN ACT CREATING THE NATIONAL MARKETING CORPORATION AND DISSOLVING THE PRICE STABILIZATION CORPORATION, APPROPRIATING FUNDS THEREFOR, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES,” approved June 17, 1955 — that chartered the National Marketing Corporation (NAMARCO) and ended the state-trading corporation PRISCO. (LawPhil — RA 1345) Section 1 declares the policy “to assist Filipino retailers and businessmen by supplying them with merchantable goods at prices that will enable them to compete successfully in the open market,” through a corporation created “not for the purpose of making profit but to render an essential public service”; Section 2 then creates the body in the act’s own words: “There is hereby created a private corporation under the name of the ‘National Marketing Corporation’ which, in short, shall be known as the ‘NAMARCO,'” to exist for twenty-five years. (LawPhil — RA 1345) The same instrument performed the succession this wiki’s cluster entries trace — Section 18 opens “The Price Stabilization Corporation (PRISCO) is hereby dissolved in the manner hereinafter provided,” moving PRISCO’s personnel, records, cash, equipment, rights, and contracts to NAMARCO, and providing that “The NAMARCO shall retain the existing regional provincial sales organization of the Price Stabilization Corporation (PRISCO),” with obligations not transferred to be “handled by the Board of Liquidators.” (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — EO 350)

The act’s design was a supply line to the Filipino retailer rather than a competitor to him: Section 5 authorizes NAMARCO “To procure and buy commodities for distribution at reasonable prices to Filipino retailers and businessmen,” and to stabilize the prices of commodities in short supply by supplying them “to the general public at fair prices through Filipino businessmen.” (LawPhil — RA 1345) Congress capitalized the corporation at ₱30,000,000 subscribed entirely by the Republic — ₱10,000,000 upon approval and ₱10,000,000 in each of the next two fiscal years — functioning as a revolving fund, with operating expenses capped at ₱1,000,000 a fiscal year and reimbursed from the Treasury; a seven-member Board, chaired ex officio by the Secretary of Commerce and Industry, governs it. (LawPhil — RA 1345) The statute remains NAMARCO’s charter of record — the corporation the postwar chain PRATRA → PRISCO → NAMARCO ends in, and the legal ancestor of the state’s later commodity-marketing ventures. (LawPhil — EO 350, LawPhil — RA 663)

Identities

Source Type	Identity
Wikipedia	N/A — no standalone article for the Act or NAMARCO (search verified empty this session)
Wikidata	N/A — entity search returns no item for the Act or the corporation (verified this session)
DBpedia	N/A — the data endpoint returns an empty resource for National_Marketing_Corporation (verified this session)
ProductOntology	N/A
Wiktionary	retailer (noun — “A retail sales company or salesman”; the beneficiary class of Section 1’s policy, not the Act) (Wiktionary — retailer)
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)	Marketing boards (sh85081346) — the subject class of the corporation the Act creates; no Act-specific heading verified (verified this session via id.loc.gov suggest) (LCSH — Marketing boards)
MeSH	N/A
NCBI Taxonomy	N/A
AGROVOC	rice (c_6599) — the staple among the prime commodities the state trading chain handled; no NAMARCO-specific concept verified (label verified this session) (AGROVOC — rice)
Google Scholar	Republic Act No. 1345 June 17 1955 National Marketing Corporation NAMARCO charter Filipino retailers PRISCO dissolution Section 18 Board of Liquidators RA 1601 distribution thru Filipinos only provincial sales organization state trading Philippines
ConceptNet	N/A (ConceptNet API unreachable this session — HTTP 502)
OpenCyc	N/A

Also Known As

RA 1345 — the docket styling
The NAMARCO charter — the styling fixed by the corporation it created
An Act Creating the National Marketing Corporation and Dissolving the Price Stabilization Corporation — the long-title styling

Examples and Analogies

A charter written as a succession: the act does two things in one instrument — births NAMARCO (Sections 1–17) and buries PRISCO (Section 18) — the dissolve-and-vest method this wiki’s Executive Order No. 350 entry records at the chain’s previous link. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — EO 350)
A wholesaler for the Filipino shopkeeper: where PRISCO had traded and licensed imports directly, NAMARCO was designed to feed goods to Filipino retailers “at reasonable prices” so they could compete — the state as supplier rather than storefront, a design RA 1601 sharpened with its 1956 command that distribution “shall be done thru Filipinos only.” (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — RA 1601)
Verified statutory data:
Approval and effectivity: June 17, 1955, effective “upon its approval” (Sec. 20) (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Creation (Sec. 2): “a private corporation,” the National Marketing Corporation, in short the NAMARCO; twenty-five-year term; principal office in Manila or Quezon City (Sec. 3) (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Capital (Sec. 6): ₱30,000,000 subscribed entirely by the Republic in three ₱10,000,000 installments; revolving fund; operating expenses not exceeding ₱1,000,000 per fiscal year, reimbursed from the Treasury (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Governance (Secs. 7–10, 15): a seven-member Board — the Secretary of Commerce and Industry as ex officio Chairman and six presidential appointees confirmed by the Commission on Appointments — over Purchasing, Marketing, and Traffic-Storage Departments (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Dissolution of PRISCO (Sec. 18): references redirected to NAMARCO; personnel, records, cash, equipment, rights, and contracts transferred; the regional-provincial sales organization retained, at least one provincial sales organization or agency per province; remaining obligations to the Board of Liquidators; Auditor General inventory; PRISCO personnel reappointed under RA 997 within 120 days, with separation gratuities of one month’s salary per year of service capped at twelve months (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Amendment: RA 1601, approved August 14, 1956 — distribution offices and agencies, wholesale contracts, distribution “thru Filipinos only,” and the presidentially appointed General Manager at ₱20,000 per annum (LawPhil — RA 1601)

Usage Scenarios

1. Citing NAMARCO’s Charter

Every question of what NAMARCO was — purpose, capital, board, departments, term — resolves to this act by section, with RA 1601’s 1956 amendments carried alongside. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — RA 1601)

2. Fixing the PRISCO Succession

What became of PRISCO’s people, records, and sales network after June 17, 1955 resolves to Section 18’s transitory scheme — the retention of the provincial sales organization, the 120-day reappointment window under RA 997, and the Board of Liquidators’ share for the rest, cited instrumentally in this wiki’s Price Stabilization Corporation entry. (LawPhil — RA 1345)

3. Tracing the Postwar Trading Chain

The act is the terminus of the chain this wiki’s cluster documents — PRATRA and NARIC merged into PRISCO by EO 350 in 1950, NARIC carved back out by RA 663 in 1951, and PRISCO dissolved into NAMARCO in 1955 — each link cited to its own instrument. (LawPhil — EO 350, LawPhil — RA 663, LawPhil — RA 1345)

4. Researching Filipino-First Distribution Policy

The act and its 1956 amendment are primary documents of the Filipino-first economic nationalism of the 1950s — a state wholesaler supplying Filipino retailers against foreign-dominated trade, with the distribution channel reserved “thru Filipinos only.” (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — RA 1601)

Strategies

Dissolve forward, never liquidate at leisure: as EO 350 had vested PRATRA and NARIC in PRISCO, Section 18 vested PRISCO’s working estate in NAMARCO and sent only the leftovers to the Board of Liquidators — trading continuity across a change of corporate personality. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — EO 350)
Keep the network, replace the mission: retaining PRISCO’s provincial sales organization while re-aiming it from price stabilization at large to supplying Filipino retailers converted a trading machine into a distribution instrument at almost no reorganization cost. (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Cap the cost of the experiment: the ₱1,000,000 yearly ceiling on operating expenses, reimbursed from the Treasury, was Congress’s fiscal leash on a non-profit corporation. (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Put the cabinet on the board: with the Secretary of Commerce and Industry chairing ex officio, the corporation’s trade answered to the department’s policy — the arrangement later contested in NAMARCO v. Arca. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — NAMARCO v. Arca)

Security and Safety Measures

Inventory and audit discipline: the dissolution opened with an inventory and valuation by the Auditor General, the fiscal control this wiki’s cluster records at every link of the chain. (LawPhil — RA 1345)
Personnel buffers: PRISCO employees not reappointed within 120 days of NAMARCO’s activation were deemed separated, with the period counted as advance notice and gratuities capped at twelve months — the cushion the 1957 Lopez litigation tested. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — Lopez v. NAMARCO)
A ceiling on the public’s exposure: the expense cap and revolving-fund structure kept losses inside the subscribed capital, earnings reverting to the fund — there being no stockholders but the Republic. (LawPhil — RA 1345)
For researchers: carry both creation terms deliberately — Section 1 promises “a government corporation” while Section 2 creates “a private corporation,” a tension the statute never resolves — and date everything to the act’s own “Approved: June 17, 1955” line. (LawPhil — RA 1345)

Historical Context

The act belongs to the Filipino-first years of the Magsaysay administration. The postwar state had already tried consolidated trading: PRISCO, created by EO 350 of October 3, 1950 out of PRATRA and NARIC, had run price stabilization through the scarcity years, losing NARIC to RA 663’s statutory extraction in 1951. (LawPhil — EO 350, LawPhil — RA 663) Congress chose a different instrument for the mid-1950s: not a stabilization trader but a public wholesaler for the Filipino retailer — NAMARCO, created on June 17, 1955 with PRISCO’s estate and provincial sales network folded into it. (LawPhil — RA 1345)

NAMARCO worked the distribution economy the act designed. RA 1601 of August 14, 1956 tightened the charter, and the corporation’s nationwide distributor relationships reached the Supreme Court within seven years — the 1962 distributor litigation, and Lopez v. NAMARCO (1957) over the succession’s personnel consequences. (LawPhil — RA 1601, LawPhil — NAMARCO v. Tan, LawPhil — Lopez v. NAMARCO) NAMARCO v. Arca (1969) found the corporation still operating and still contested, and the Senate’s issuances library files its later winding-up under the Board of Liquidators — the agency this wiki’s cluster meets whenever a state corporation’s obligations outlive its charter. (LawPhil — NAMARCO v. Arca, Senate Issuances Library — NAMARCO)

Challenges and Controversies

“Private Corporation” or “Government Corporation”?

The act’s own opening sections disagree: Section 1 announces a government corporation rendering “an essential public service,” while Section 2 creates “a private corporation” under NAMARCO’s name — language the era’s charters used loosely and courts later had to construe against the reality of a wholly state-subscribed board-managed body. The tension is in the text; this entry records it rather than resolves it. (LawPhil — RA 1345)

The Fate the Record Does Not Fix

What instrument finally dissolved NAMARCO could not be verified from primary sources this session: the verified record runs from the 1955 charter through RA 1601’s 1956 amendments to litigation in 1957, 1962, and 1969, and ends with the Senate library’s classification of the corporation under the Board of Liquidators’ winding-up. This entry asserts no dissolution date and names no successor instrument. (LawPhil — RA 1345, Senate Issuances Library — NAMARCO)

A Statute Without a Register

Neither the act nor NAMARCO has a standalone Wikipedia article, a Wikidata item, or a DBpedia resource — all three verified empty this session — so, like the cluster’s other instruments, the act’s public memory lives in the statute book, the LawPhil and Supreme Court E-Library copies, and the litigation that cited it. (LawPhil — RA 1345, LawPhil — NAMARCO v. Tan)