Consumer group warns vs subpar imported cement

The National Coalition of Filipino Consumers (NCFC) has warned about the proliferation of substandard imported cement in the market and urged the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) to immediately conduct a probe.

The NCFC said it has discovered expired, mislabeled and unlabeled cement being sold and used in the provinces and parts of Metro Manila after it conducted initial investigations and test buys.

The products, the consumer group said, are being sold in hardware stores and even used in public works projects, thereby posing serious threats to the general public.

NCFC spokesperson and legal counsel Oliver San Antonio said the group’s investigations and test buys were prompted by reports it received that substandard cement is being sold in areas like La Union, Davao and Caloocan City.

“We received initial reports from consumers that expired imported cement was being openly sold in the marketplace, so we conducted our own investigations. The reports turned out to be true,” San Antonio said.

“We were actually able to buy expired cement in La Union and in Davao, and that’s just an initial sampling. We’re sure there are more substandard cement in other parts of the country being offered to unsuspecting consumers,” he added.

San Antonio said the group has purchase receipts and photos of hardware stores and public works projects using old, mislabeled and substandard cement.

“When we inspected the construction site of a Caloocan City high school in early August, we saw hundreds of cement bags, labelled with the Buffalo Cement brand from Vietnam, being used to build a fourstory structure,” he said.

“The labels have a manufacturing date of December 2016, making it more than nine months old. This is way over the maximum six-month shelf life imposed by the DTI,” he added.

San Antonio said the same expired brand of cement was also being sold in La Union when the group went to check consumer complaints there earlier this month.

The Philippine National Standard states that “cement remaining in bulk storage at the plant/storage silo prior to shipment for more than six months, or cement in bags in local storage in the hands of a vendor for more than three months, needs to be retested.”

The NCFC warned that old cement does not set well and is likely to fail compression tests that are being done to determine whether a cement product is good enough to be sold in the market.