Executive: Cebu’s cement industry stable
APO Cement Corp.’s raising the price of its cement products by P20 per bag following the Naga City landslide is not an indication of a shortage of cement products in Cebu.
Takashi Miyashita, Taiheiyo Cement Philippines Inc. senior vice president, gave this assessment of the cement industry in Cebu.
“Perhaps the decrease in production is not because of the increase of raw materials’ price per se, but mainly due to the lack of availability of such material, as a result of the landslide incident,” Miyashita said in an email interview.
APO cement in a statement on November 21 said that the price increase of their products was caused by the suspension of its primary raw material supplier after the landslide.
The company said it encountered “significant cost pressures in its operations” because they now source their raw materials from other parts of the country and even abroad.
Environment Secretary Roy Cimatu has ordered for the temporary cancellation of the Environmental Compliance Certificate of Apo Land & Quarry Corporation (ALQC) during his visit in Cebu on Sept. 21, a day after the landslide.
The impact of the ban on the company’s business did not only reflect on the higher production costs, but also in a six-month temporary layoff of a chunk of its manpower including 30 percent of its employees and 40 percent of its contractual workers.
Apo Cement also closed down its Davao City terminal, one of its two Mindanao stations, and indefinitely suspended the operation of one of its two kilns in their Naga City plant due to the low volume of raw materials to be processed. The kiln is the equipment used to produce the clinker, the material needed for cement production.
As a result, the downsized workforce of Apo Cement is also faced with a compressed work-week scheme starting third week of December.
Workers of Apo Cement have staged two protests to date, in Naga City Hall and in the regional office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR-7) in Cebu City, in hopes that ALQC be allowed to resume operations and save the plant employees from losing their jobs.
In a briefing during the presentation of the hazard reduction plan for the landslide site on Nov. 29, Apo Cement Communications Director Chito Maniago said their executives would continue to discuss with the DENR to appeal that they be allowed to resume operations.
Meanwhile, Taiheiyo’s Miyashita assured that the San Fernando, Cebu-based Taiheiyo Cement would not be raising the prices of its products anytime soon, despite the company feeling the harsh effect of the country’s high inflation rate.
“It has always been our commitment to provide the Cebu market with stable cement supply, being our home turf, notwithstanding the Apo incident,” said Miyashita.
For Miyashita, the cement industry could still comfortably provide for the demand of region.
“In their own respective rights, both Taiheiyo and Apo are leading companies in Cebu,” he said.
APO Cement accounts for 20 percent of clinker production and 60 percent of Cemex Philippines’ total volume in the country where at least 275,000 bags are produced per day. Clinker is used to manufacture cement.
“APO Cement continues to adopt measures to cope with the challenges of not having equitable sources of raw materials to produce cement,” the company said in a statement. /With Correspondent Rosalie O. Abatayo
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