DTI urged to prohibit imports of induction furnace

Local steelmakers have asked the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to prohibit the importation of obsolete induction furnace facilities from China which they said could only produce substandard and highly pollutant construction steel products.

In a letter to DTI Secretary Ramon M. Lopez, the Philippine Iron & Steel Institute (PISI) said the Chinese government already banned these facilities from producing construction grade steel in January 2017 for the same reasons. But these facilities now found their way into the local market.

PISI echoed the same concerns previously aired by the ASEAN Iron and Steel Council (AISC).

“We write to raise our concern over the recent development in our domestic steel industry whereby obsolete induction furnace facilities are being moved from China to the Philippines to produce construction grade steel products,” PISI said in a letter signed by the group’s president Roberto M. Cola.

PISI explained that the main drawback of induction furnace facilities is the absence of a refining process to remove the harmful elements in the liquid steel, resulting in the inconsistent quality of construction grade steel products manufactured from these facilities.

“The questionable quality poses a major safety hazard given that most of these products are reinforcing steel bars used in construction of buildings and infrastructures,” said PISI. (BCM)