Environment-friendly cement company

Newspaperwomen are normally skeptical beings, but when a dozen of us visited the facilities of the CEMEX Philippines in Naga, Cebu, all skepticism about the facility being environment-friendly disappeared. Huge buildings with smokestacks lorded over the landscape, and just a few meters down the green lawn was a blue lagoon in which ducks were swimming to their hearts’ content. They didn’t look like they would succumb to a respiratory illness. On the contrary, CEMEX officials told our group, it will be safe even for humans to swim in the pond.

The visit was full of surprises. The women, who had not been in a cement facility before, had visions of cement dust darkening the air. There were particles of dust in the air, true, but the grey atmosphere about us was fog – at noontime. We went inside the office building where computers monitored the burning of limestone, clay and iron ore in a kiln, and we were told, with 40 percent of the fuel and governed by temperature, heating rate, burning rate and cooling rate, clinkerization occurs at 1350 to 1400 degrees centigrade, forming material into small, dark gray nodules of 3-4 centimeters in diameter which are made to flow out into reciprocating coolers and cooled by quenching air from 1200 degrees centigrade to 100 degrees centigrade. The clinker is transported to the storage silo and gypsum is added to it in definite proportions to control the setting time of the final product – cement. The materials are then ground in a ball mill to the desired fineness and stored in cement silos.

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CEMEX S.A. de C.V., founded in 1906, is one of the three largest cement companies in the world, with approximately 80 million tons of annual production capacity. CEMEX is a leading global producer and marketer of cement and ready-mix products, with operations concentrated in the world’s most dynamic cement markets across four continents. It has operations in 30 countries and trade relations with more than 60 countries around the globe. It is the leading producer of white cement and is the largest trader of cement and clinker in the world.

According to CEMEX officials, in 1997, CEMEX entered Asia, through the Philippines, by buying into Rizal Cement. Two years later, CEMEX Philippines Group of Companies (CEMEX Philippines) bought into APO Cement Corporation whose plant is based in Cebu, making them the second largest cement producer in the country. Under the Philippines Group of Companies’ wing are APO Cement’s plant in Naga, Cebu; Solid Cement’s plant in Antipolo, Rizal; Rizal Cement’s plant in Binangonan, Rizal; CEMEX Concrete’s batching plant in Muntinlupa City, Island Quarry and Aggregates Corporation, and APO Land and Quarry Corporation.

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CEMEX, as a "good corporate citizen," has earned ISO certifications. Both Solid Cement and APO Cement received their ISO 14001 certifications for environment management systems in 2000, barely a year after receiving their ISO 9002 certifications.

Both companies also received their ISO 9002 certifications for quality management systems in August 1999 and in February 2000. Recently, CEMEX Concrete’s Muntinlupa-based batching plant received its ISO 9002. These certifications are vital proofs of recognition of the CEMEX group of companies’ meeting the highest international operation and management standards.

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Confirming the public relations people’s claim of CEMEX’s having a "heart" is its various socio-civic programs. The company is the first to participate in the government’s PCs for Public High Schools project. It has installed computers in Antipolo and Naga schools, benefiting at least 3,000 students in the fist year of installation.

The most widely acclaimed project of APO Cement is its 2001 donation of ten personal computers to the Naga National High School. Also, it inked a memorandum of agreement with the high school, the local government of Naga under Mayor Ferdinand Chiong, and the Philippine Business for Social Progress for the construction of a computer lab for the computer students. The project is to be completed this month.

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CEMEX has put up day care centers within the plants’ communities, preparing children from ages 3 to 6 years, for their elementary education.

For out-of-school youth, the company, in cooperation with the government’s Technical Education and Skills Development Authority, offers vocational, technical and livelihood training programs. These are aimed at keeping them away from drugs and other bad habits, and providing income-generating opportunities for the unemployed through livelihood training.

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Environmental initiatives are being adopted by the APO and Solid plants, the former’s lagoon and the latter’s Marilyn Lake are considered "environmental marvels making them benchmarks for other cement and industrial plants." Tree-planting, recycling and waste management projects, animal breeding and preservation projects are some of these initiatives which won for CEMEX Philippines the ANVIL Merit Award for environment protection.

In the field of health, CEMEX conducts medical missions in both APO and Solid plants, serving the medical and/or dental needs of the communities surrounding the plants as well as the families of plant personnel.

Other notable features found in the Naga and Solid Cement communities are Roman Catholic chapels. What we saw in Naga were testimonials to the organizing skills of CEMEX’s corporate communication director, Juris Soliman. These are the chapel, a gymnasium, an all-purpose hall (housing among others, a livelihood-training room, the Ladies’ Club room, a medical clinic and a body-fitness room). Juris says the tennis court beside the gymnasium is the oldest in the Visayas, and we agree with her that it should be considered a landmark by the National Historical Commission.

Juris points further to CEMEX Concrete’s community projects. The company donates concrete to various streets and pathways in Cebu, cement and anti-bacterial concrete to construction projects in Pembo, Makati and the Elsie Gachies Village in Muntinlupa. Rizal Cement, a member of the CEMZ Philippines group of companies, has donated a squatter relocation site in Binangonan, Rizal.

The whole-day’s excursion was satisfying, convincing us newspaperwomen that there are companies which make money but have a heart, too.

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ON ANOTHER FRONT, the Program in Development Economics or PDE of the UP School of Economics will hold its annual reunion on December 7, 2 p.m., at the Diosdado P. Macapagal Hall.

Highlight of the reunion is the PDE national lecture that will discuss "The Global Environment and the Prospects for the Philippine Economy." Dr. Dante B. Canlas, NEDA secretary, Dr. Cielito Habito, professor, Ateneo de Manila University and president of the Philippine Economic Society, and Peter Wallace, president of the Economic Intelligence Unit, will be the main speakers.

Pakito Yeneza is head of the reunion’s organizing committee. PDE alumni may call Rose San Pascual at tel nos. 920-5481 and 927-9686. Or call the PDE office at tel. 920-5481.

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My e-mail address: [email protected]