National Rice and Corn Corporation

Also known as: NARIC — the abbreviation used in the Supreme Court's own recital of the corporation's history · The defunct NARIC — Republic Act No. 663's own designation of the dissolved corporation whose assets it reclaimed · The rice and corn corporation of the National Development Company — the founding-era styling · Not to be confused with the Rice and Corn Production Administration (RCPA), the machinery-and-production agency dissolved in 1950 outside the procurement lineage

Government

Definition

The National Rice and Corn Corporation (NARIC) was the Philippine state trading corporation for the two staple grains — the body through which the Commonwealth and postwar states bought, imported, milled, and distributed rice and corn in an economy that chronically fell short of feeding itself. The Supreme Court’s 2024 recital of the corporation’s record states its origin plainly: “Under the auspices of National Development Company (NDC) or ‘Compania de Fomento National,’ the National Rice and Corn Corporation (NARIC) was created as a subsidiary. It started operation in 1936, shortly after its designation as a relief organization by the President of the Philippines, tasked to import rice, free of duty, under Proclamation No. 58, Series of 1936,” amid “the serious shortage of rice and imminent danger of inflation of prices in the country as a result of market manipulations.” (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472) Historical register; defunct — the corporation was dissolved and revived twice before its final abolition in 1962, and its stock, staff, and mandate descend in an unbroken line into today’s National Food Authority.

NARIC’s life ran through five instruments. Executive Order No. 93 (1947) made it independent: “The National Rice and Corn Corporation shall cease to be a subsidiary of the National Development Company,” with the NDC’s rights and assets transferred “at book and/or par value.” (LawPhil — EO 93) Executive Order No. 350 (October 23, 1950) dissolved it into the Price Stabilization Corporation: “The Philippine Relief and Trade Rehabilitation Administration and the National Rice and Corn Corporation are hereby dissolved,” with references to NARIC “including its designation under Act No. 4198” henceforth reading as references to PRISCO. (LawPhil — EO 350) Republic Act No. 663 (June 16, 1951) resurrected it as a fully government-owned corporation of ₱20 million capital under its long title “AN ACT TO DEVELOP AND IMPROVE THE RICE AND CORN INDUSTRIES, TO STABILIZE THE PRICE OF RICE AND TO PROMOTE THE SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS OF THE PEOPLE ENGAGED IN THE PRODUCTION OF THESE STAPLE FOODS,” empowered “To buy, sell, import, export, deal in, barter, exchange and handle in every other manner, rice and corn,” with the defunct corporation’s properties reverted from PRISCO. (LawPhil — RA 663) Republic Act No. 3452 (June 14, 1962) ended it: “The National Rice and Corn Corporation is hereby abolished and all its assets, liabilities, functions, powers which are not inconsistent with the provisions of this Act, and all personnel are transferred to the Administration” — the Rice and Corn Administration. (LawPhil — RA 3452)

Identities

Source Type	Identity
Wikipedia	N/A — no standalone article; the corporation is not mentioned in the National Food Authority (Philippines) article (verified this session)
Wikidata	N/A — no entity matching “National Rice and Corn Corporation” (search verified)
DBpedia	N/A — no resource data returned for National_Rice_and_Corn_Corporation this session
ProductOntology	N/A
Wiktionary	N/A — no headword “NARIC” (verified)
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH)	N/A — LC authorities unreachable this session
MeSH	N/A
NCBI Taxonomy	N/A
AGROVOC	rice (c_6599) — the staple traded; no NARIC-specific concept verified
Google Scholar	National Rice and Corn Corporation NARIC Philippines 1936 National Development Company subsidiary rice importation Proclamation 58 Act 4198 EO 93 1947 EO 350 PRISCO RA 663 1951 RA 3452 Rice and Corn Administration price stabilization
ConceptNet	N/A
OpenCyc	N/A

Also Known As

NARIC — the abbreviation used in the Supreme Court’s own recital of the corporation’s history
The defunct NARIC — Republic Act No. 663’s own designation of the dissolved corporation whose assets it reclaimed
The rice and corn corporation of the National Development Company — the founding-era styling
Not to be confused with the Rice and Corn Production Administration (RCPA), the machinery-and-production agency dissolved in 1950 outside the procurement lineage

Examples and Analogies

A corporation that kept dying and returning: NARIC’s history is a cycle of dissolution and revival — subsidiary of the NDC from 1936, independent by 1947, dissolved into PRISCO in 1950, resurrected by statute in 1951, abolished into the Rice and Corn Administration in 1962 — one mandate surviving five legal personalities in twenty-six years. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)
A relief agency that became a market regulator: the corporation entered the world not as a business but as a relief organization designated to import rice duty-free during a shortage — the emergency that became, and remained, its reason for being through the war and after. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)
A genealogy in five instruments: EO 93, EO 350, RA 663, RA 3452 — each instrument transferring the estate forward whole, the pattern the Supreme Court traces forward through the Rice and Corn Board and the National Grains Authority to the National Food Authority. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472, Wikipedia — National Food Authority (Philippines))
Verified statutory data:
Origin: created as a subsidiary of the National Development Company; started operation 1936; designated a relief organization importing rice free of duty under Proclamation No. 58, series of 1936, amid shortage and price manipulation (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)
Independence: EO No. 93 (1947) — cessation of the NDC subsidiary status; NDC rights, titles, and interests transferred to NARIC at book and/or par value (LawPhil — EO 93)
Dissolution: EO No. 350 (October 23, 1950), issued pursuant to Republic Act No. 422 — NARIC and PRTRA dissolved; personnel, records, properties, assets, rights, obligations, and contracts transferred to PRISCO; references including the Act No. 4198 designation deemed references to PRISCO (LawPhil — EO 350)
Re-creation: RA No. 663, approved June 16, 1951 — fully government-owned corporation to develop the rice and corn industries, stabilize prices, and promote producers’ welfare; ₱20 million capital in 200,000 shares of ₱100 par, government-subscribed with voting rights vested in the President; five-member board appointed with Commission on Appointments consent; powers to buy, sell, import, export, and deal in rice and corn, to own trucks, elevators, mills, and warehouses, and to lend to producers; exempt from import duty on rice, corn, fertilizers, and lime; the prior NARIC dissolved, its net book value exchanged for shares (LawPhil — RA 663)
Abolition: RA No. 3452, approved June 14, 1962 — Section 13 abolition and transfer of assets, liabilities, functions, and personnel to the Rice and Corn Administration (LawPhil — RA 3452)
Succession: RCA abolished into the National Grains Authority by PD No. 4 (September 26, 1972); NGA renamed National Food Authority by PD No. 1770 (January 14, 1981) (Wikipedia — National Food Authority (Philippines))

Usage Scenarios

1. Studying the Philippine Food-Agency Lineage

NARIC is the first link in the chain this wiki traces to the National Food Authority: NARIC (1936) to the RCA (1962) to the National Grains Authority (1972) to the NFA (1981) — the continuous institutional history of the Philippine state’s hand in the rice market. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472, Wikipedia — National Food Authority (Philippines))

2. Importing Rice in a Shortage

The corporation’s founding operation — duty-free importation under a presidential relief designation during manipulation-driven shortage — remains the template of Philippine crisis response: the state as importer of last resort when private trade fails the market. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)

3. Administering Grain Prices

Under RA 663 the corporation stabilized prices “consistent with the average cost of production” and consumer purchasing power while trading in every form — the statutory design of administered staple prices that successor agencies repeated for four decades. (LawPhil — RA 663)

4. Tracing the Postwar Reorganizations

EO 93 and EO 350 are primary documents of the Quirino-era reorganization under Republic Act No. 422 — NARIC among the corporate bodies converted, merged, and dissolved as the reconstruction state restructured its economic machinery. (LawPhil — EO 93, LawPhil — EO 350)

Strategies

State trading as emergency measure: NARIC was born designated a relief organization rather than chartered as a business — importation authority resting on the emergency designation under Act No. 4198 and Proclamation No. 58 rather than on ordinary commercial law. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472, LawPhil — EO 350)
Transfer the estate, never liquidate it: every dissolution — 1947, 1950, 1951, 1962 — moved rights, assets, and obligations wholesale at book value into the next legal person, preserving the machinery while changing its owner. (LawPhil — EO 93, LawPhil — RA 663)
Capitalize from the treasury: the 1951 corporation’s ₱20 million was fully government-subscribed with the voting rights vested in the President — fiscal control by full ownership rather than regulation. (LawPhil — RA 663)
Keep development alongside trade: RA 663 paired its trading powers with loans to producers, fertilizer and lime distribution, demonstration farms, and education — production-side instruments intended to make the trading side unnecessary. (LawPhil — RA 663)

Security and Safety Measures

Food-supply security as founding purpose: the corporation existed because “the serious shortage of rice and imminent danger of inflation of prices” threatened the Commonwealth — keeping the population fed as the standing security objective its successors inherited. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)
Duty-free importation for relief: the Act No. 4198 designation and RA 663’s import-duty exemption armed the state to move grain into the country quickly in crisis — the fiscal instrument of supply security. (LawPhil — EO 350, LawPhil — RA 663)
Presidential control of the corporation’s vote: government shares voted by the President and directors appointed with Commission on Appointments consent placed the trading corporation under elected authority — the accountability structure of the 1951 charter. (LawPhil — RA 663)
For researchers: the corporation’s own founding instrument — the NDC resolution or order of 1936 creating the subsidiary — is not named in the verified record, which documents the origin only through the Supreme Court’s recital and the 1947–1951 instruments; claims about NARIC’s prewar operations should be dated and sourced accordingly, and the procurement NARIC kept distinct from the production-side RCPA. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472, LawPhil — EO 93)

Historical Context

NARIC was born in the rice crisis of the Commonwealth’s first year. The National Development Company — itself rebuilt by Commonwealth Act No. 182 in November 1936 as the state’s ₱50-million investment corporation — stood godparent to the grains subsidiary that began operating in 1936, designated a relief organization to bring in duty-free rice while speculators worked a short market. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472) The war scattered the corporation; reconstruction restored it — EO 93 of 1947 cut it loose from the NDC at book value, and EO 350 of October 23, 1950 folded it into PRISCO with the other rehabilitation bodies. (LawPhil — EO 93, LawPhil — EO 350)

Congress reversed the dissolution within a year: RA 663 of June 16, 1951 re-created NARIC as a fully owned government corporation, pulled its properties back from PRISCO, and capitalized it at ₱20 million. (LawPhil — RA 663) The 1951 corporation ran the rice-short 1950s until RA 3452 of June 14, 1962 abolished it into the Rice and Corn Administration; the lineage then passed through the Rice and Corn Board to the National Grains Authority created by PD 4 in martial law’s first week (September 26, 1972), and to the National Food Authority renamed by PD 1770 on January 14, 1981 — the modern descendant of the relief corporation of 1936. (LawPhil — RA 3452, Wikipedia — National Food Authority (Philippines))

Challenges and Controversies

An Agency Known by Its Funerals

NARIC is documented almost entirely through the instruments that created, converted, dissolved, revived, and abolished it — the Supreme Court’s 2024 recital, two executive orders, and two statutes. Its administrators, its trading volumes, and its year-by-year operations between 1936 and 1962 remain to be reconstructed from primary records; this entry registers the corporation at the resolution the verified record supports. (LawPhil — G.R. No. 261472)

Dissolved by Order, Revived by Statute

The 1950–1951 sequence is a constitutional argument in institutional form: President Quirino’s EO 350 dissolved the corporation under the reorganization authority of RA 422, and the following Congress brought it back by statute and reclaimed the assets from PRISCO — the elected branches contesting, within a single year, whether a grains trader should be a corporation at all. (LawPhil — EO 350, LawPhil — RA 663)

State Trading Against the Market

RA 663’s powers — to “buy, sell, import, export, deal in, barter, exchange and handle in every other manner” the two staples, alongside mills, warehouses, and lending — made NARIC the state’s merchant in the country’s most political commodity. The design’s beneficiaries and costs were debated from the beginning; the eventual answer, decades later in the Rice Tariffication Law era, was to strip the lineage’s import monopoly away — the endpoint of the argument NARIC began. (LawPhil — RA 663, Wikipedia — National Food Authority (Philippines))