Steel

Every administration brags about bountiful remittances it is able to derive from overseas Filipino workers to augment domestic incomes. It’s something to be ashamed of, though, for it actually reveals their failures. Eleven million talented Filipinos are forced to work abroad because there is no steel industry to spark businesses, boost employment, and modernize agriculture.…

Government policies are always affected by whose interest is being considered. In the case of the steel industry, the clashing interests are those of the importers and the traders, Roberto Cola said. He cited China, which now offers rebates to steel manufacturers. The Chinese government encourages exporting high value added products. It discourages exports of…

A steady supply of iron ore is not a necessity for the Philippines to develop its steel industry, Roberto Cola said.

ROBERTO Cola, the president of the Philippine Steel and Iron Institute (PISI), says the primary cause of the decline of the steel industry is its failure to integrate. He also said that is again being seen today: “There’s lack of value adding among the present local players.”

Why did succeeding Cabinet members in charge of the Philippine economy—after the Marcos regime—let Philippine industrialization shrink to its present state of almost nothingness? Why did they abandon our steel industry, which any freshman-level economics or engineering student knows, is the lifeblood of industrialization?

Local steel fabricators have asked the government to allow the importation of raw materials from Japan despite opposition from Global Steel Philippines Inc., citing the inferior quality and the limited volume of the country’s sole producer.

MANILA, Philippines – The government must put in place measures to protect the local steel industry from artificially cheap products dumped into the country.