Consumer-industry group Philippine Product Safety and Quality Foundation (PPSQF) said the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) should file charges against 41 hardware stores found to be selling substandard steel.
In a statement, PPSQF said none of the 41 retailers which were found by the Philippine Iron and Steel Institute (PISI) as selling below par steel in their test buys were charged.
PPSQF said PISI secured evidences that reinforcing bar steel samples did not meet quality and safety when tested by the Metals Industry Research and Development Council.
The rebars were found to be underweight, undersized or failed to have the needed specifications in tensile strength, elongation ,and lug height.
PPQF said the poor quality rebars were found nationwide- La Union, Ilocos Sur, Ilocos Norte, Cagayan, Nueva Ecija, Tarlac, Bataan, Zambales, Pangasinan, Mindoro, Batangas, Laguna, Cavite, Cagayan de Oro, Lanao del Norte, Agusan del Norte, Davao, Cotabato and Zamboanga.
PPSQF urged DTI to exhaustively police the distribution of substandard steel and other construction materials.
Meneleo Carlos, PPSQF chairman emeritus, said the Bureau of Product Standards should conduct mandatory inspection of steel.
PPQF quoted Abeto Uy, Philsteel Holdings Corp. chairman, as saying consumers should also check on Total Coated Thickness (TCT) of galvanized iron (GI) sheets before buying.
TCT is the combined thickness of the steel and the metallic coating of zinc and aluminum of the GI sheet. It protects the GI sheet from rust and has high heat reflectivity, cutting electricity cost.
PPSQF also also quoted Benjamin Yao, SteelAsia Corp. chairman, as saying unscrupulous manufacturers will deliberately roll a rebar with a minus 10 percent or more variance.
PPSQF said these lightweight products are unsafe, and will not perform to the design specification and standard.
A rebar is a reinforcement steel used as the foundation of houses and buildings.
