Republic Cement Corp., the country’s largest cement firm, Wednesday said they are cooperating with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) against unscrupulous traders that have been overpricing and hoarding cement stressing that cement supply has already normalized and that retail prices for its cement should be within P210 to P215 per 40-kilogram bag only in the National Capital Region.

Rene Sunico, president of Republic Cement Corp., has clarified that supply from deliveries from its Bulacan plant has normalized to an average of 20 to 25 trucks a day from the 150 trucks lining up for deliveries before December 25 when other plants in the Bulacan area by other cement manufacturers cannot produce as they were having maintenance issues.

There is no problem also with deliveries from its Batangas plant because the Mahanadyong Bridge in Taisan, which was reduced to 10-ton capacity, is now operating at 25 ton-capacity after its rehabilitation with the help of the private sector and is being upgraded to a 50-ton bridge capacity.

Companies have been using the Mahanadyong bridge instead of the Bridge of Promise, which repair would be taking a longer time.

Sunico said that cement supply in the NCR was supposed to be back to normal after Christmas.

Republic Cement, which is owned by global cement firm Lafarge Cement, has already submitted the initial list of its accredited dealers together with their inventories and prices to the Cement Manufacturers Association of the Philippines, which will in turn submit it to the DTI.

“We are going to submit it to the association within the day,” Sunico said.

The DTI has required cement firms to submit their accredited dealers, inventories and prices to really get into the bottom of the high prices and shortage in cement supply.

He, however, said that the most they can do to their dealers is moral suasion.

“I guess more of moral suasion because once the cement is out of our gates we don’t have much control on them because we have prices for our dealers and dealers have their separate prices to their retailers,” he said.

“Supply is normal now, it is just a matter of finding out why there is an overpricing of cement to P250 per bag,” he said.

Republic Cement had informed the DTI last December 16 of their decision to raise prices by P3.

“We told DTI that retail price should be more than P205 and our cement retail price should range from P210 to P215 per bag in the NCR,” he said.

Since cement has gone as high as P260 in the NCR, Sunico said, “There are some retailers that are taking advantage of the situation.”

Republic Cement has four plants in Luzon including Bulacan, Batangas, Teresa in Rizal and Nurzagaray.