By Bernie Cahiles-Magkilat

The country’s leading steel firm Steel Asia Manufacturing Corp. (SteelAsia) expressed its commitment to the revitalization of the Philippine steel industry with an investment of over P100 billion in the next five years.

Speaking before the Senate Committee on Trade, Commerce, and Entrepreneurship Tuesday, SteelAsia Vice President and Head of Business Development Rafael Hidalgo agreed there’s a need to revitalize the steel industry for the country’s industrialization as indicated in Senate Resolution No. 802 filed by Senator JV Ejercito.

To help achieve this, SteelAsia is set to quadruple its capacity by 2023 with the establishment of about 30 new mills in its existing plants and five new sites which would be dispersed across the country.

“That will help us reach 70 percent self-sufficiency in steel by 2023 which is way ahead of the 2030 target indicated in the Iron and Steel Industry Roadmap study presented by the Philippine Iron and Steel Institute (PISI),” Hidalgo said during the hearing.

Ejercito stressed the need to have our own steel industry to reduce imports and prepare for the massive infrastructure requirements of the country. “We are now looking at the future. We have to plan for our future,” he said.

Hidalgo informed the Senate committee that SteelAsia is investing over P100 billion in the next five years to more than double its capacity through more upstream facilities with the establishment of new integrated steelmaking plants using recycling technologies and expansion of its midstream and downstream products to include H beams, sheet piles, wire rods, steel plates, and reinforcing steel mesh.

He pointed out that these investments are focused on basic sectors to substitute steel imports which reportedly amounted to $4 billion (around P212 billion) last year and create linkages to support infrastructure development and downstream industries.

Hidalgo also said that SteelAsia is regionalizing to create logistic savings and bring down the cost of steel while spurring regional economic activities and job creation.

Ejercito said in his resolution that “no less than President Duterte emphasized the need to revive the steel industry… (and) would vigorously push for the revitalization of the country’s steel industry as one way of achieving economic growth.”

He also said that “the iron and steel sector is currently operating far below its full economic potential, (thus) there is an urgent need to review the government’s policies and roadmap for the steel industry.”