In Focus: Industrial City

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Industrial City of Iligan  - A major component of the Cagayan de Oro-Iligan Corridor (CIC), the fastest growing regional growth center in Mindanao and one of the priority investment areas in the Philippines.  Iligan City is a diamond in the rough. Under-explored by local and foreign tourists alike, it is one city which promises to captivate its visitors with its gifts of nature, blended with signs of industrialization.

Iligan as an industrial city is intertwined with the history of the National Power Corporation and the expansion of its operation in Mindanao. In 1937, NPC began gathering hydrologic data of the main river systems in the country. The power corporation investigated and surveyed a total of six of these river systems together with other streams. One of them was the Lake Lanao-Agus River system. The data gathered by NPC became the basis of identifying the sites with hydroelectric potentials. Thus, as the succeeding events would show, the auspicious beginning of Iligan as an industrial city in Mindanao started to unfold.

Hydro-Electric Power Plants

           

Actual construction began in August 1950. Pres. Quirino accompanied by his daughter and some cabinet officials visited Iligan in December 1951 to unveil a marker of the Maria Cristina Falls development project. This manifested the importance his administration attached to the projects. The marker is situated in the old NPC housing just above the famous falls.

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Agus V Hydroelectric Plant

Agus V Hydroelectric Plant is one of the hydroelectric generating plants harnessing raw water power potential along the Agus river.

It is a two-unit run-of-the-river type with a combined capacity of 55 megawatts and is situated between the tailwater of Agus IV HEP and the headwater of Agus VI HEP. It is located at Ditucalan, Iligan City some 13 kilometers from Iligan City proper and it is within the proximity of the famous Tinago Falls in the west and the Maria Cristina Falls in the North.

AGUS 6 Hydroelectric Plant

Of the seven (7) hydro sites constructed along the Agus River, the Agus VI was first to be developed and completed because the site was the most feasible, the simpliest and the most economical to construct and the nearest to expected power consumers. Construction of the project was authorized by the then, Pres. Elpidio Quirino in 1950.

The Agus VI H.E. Plant, originally known as the Maria Christina Falls Hydroelectric Plant, named after the famous scenic waterfalls just 100 meters in the background.

AGUS 7 Hydroelectric Plant

Downstream of the existing Agus VI Hydroelectric Plant is Agus VII Hydroelectric Plant, constructed near the mouth of Agus river located at Fuentes, Iligan City. The plant is the most downstream of the series of hydroelectric plants built by the National Power Corporation in the Agus River from Marawi City to Iligan City.

On January 16,1979, the construction of this project was started. The civil works was awarded and constructed by CDCP, which includes the construction of the main powerhouse, dam structures, and diversion tunnel. Electro-mechanical erection works were performed by the National Power Corporation personnel under supervision of Italian and Japanese consultants. The main equipment were supplied by Gruppo Industrie Elettro (GIE), Italy and the various control equipment by Fuji Electric Co. Ltd., Japan. The construction cost of the plant was P624.22 million.

In May 1953, NPC commissioned the first generating unit (a Westinghouse generator and turbine) of the Maria Cristina Hydroelectric Plant. The bulk of its 25 megawatts of generated electricity was absorbed by the companion fertilizer plant, which produced its first bag of ammonium sulfate fertilizer in September 1953. For fiscal year 1953-1954, the fertilizer plant was one of the three big customers of NPC power in Iligan. The other two were the government-owned National Shipyard and Steel Corporation (NASSCO) which operated as steel mill and the Iligan Electric Company, an electric franchise holder in the city.

On October 16, 1954, Maria Cristina Chemical Industries, Inc. (MCCI) inaugurated its calcium carbide plant and in 1959, its ferroalloy plant in Iligan. Founded two years earlier by Judge Guillermo B. Guevara, MCCI was NPC’s fourth customer in the city and the first private industrial firm to utilize electricity generated by the Maria Cristina power plant.

 

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Steel Mills    

Iligan Integrated Steel Mills, Inc. (IISMI) – The first fully-integrated steel mill in the Philippines

In 1962, NASSCO was completely sold to the Jacinto family.

DON FERNANDO P. JACINTO: Industrialist behind IISMI

Credit for the establishment of the Iligan Integrated Steel Mills, Inc. rightfully belongs to lawyer-industrialist Fernando P. Jacinto. Jacinto displayed pioneering determination when he undertook to establish the country’s first fully-integrated steel mill, the returns of which cannot be expected until 15 or 20 years – at a time when most of he country’s moneyed groups would rather invest in ventures promising immediate returns.

Visiting Japan in 1954 when it was undergoing a massive rehabilitation program, Jacinto saw the importance of the steel industry in nation building. Upon his return to the Philippines, he organized Jacinto Steel, Inc., which under his direction became the country’s major manufacturer of galvanized iron roofing.

When the Philippine government decided in early 1962, upon recommendation of the US export-Import Bank, to turn over its integrated steel project to the private sector, Jacinto Steel, Inc. won the bid. A major factor in naming Jacinto Steel as “leader participant” was the high regard for Fernando P. Jacinto in international financial and industrial sectors.

Considered the most modern and technologically advanced steel mill complex in Southeast Asia, IISMI utilized the services and products of Koppers, Inc., Blaw-Knox Inc., International General Elecric Co., Westinghouse Electric Intenational Co., Atlantic Gulf & Pacific Co. of Manila, Inc., American Consulting Corp. headed by Jack A. Coletti, Kawatetsu rading Co., Ltd., Fuji Iron and Steel Co. Ltd., Kawasaki Steel Corp., and Mitsubishi Shoji Kaisha, Ltd.

Source: The Grey Chronicles

Global Steelworks Philippines, Inc. (formerly National Steel Corporation) in Brgy. Suarez

National Steel Corporation was under the Office of the Liquidator from 1999 (officially beginning 2000) to 2004. It was acquired by Global Steel Holdings, Ltd. [GSHL] of Pramod Mittal's Ispat Group. Initially known as as Global Steelworks Infrastructure Inc. [GSII], then SEC-registered on October 2005 as Global Steel Philippines, Inc.

The Coming of More Industries

The type of industries that were first established in Iligan are those requiring heavy consumption of electricity. These electrometallurgical and electrochemical ventures served as pioneers in an area that later grew into Mindanao’s industrial center. Their presence in a rather frontier territory soon attracted other industries and caused rapid urbanization of Iligan. These industries may have other reasons to come. Among which were Iligan’s locational advantage, adequate harbor, proximity to industrial raw materials, transportation facilities or the government’s policy of industrial dispersal. However, all of them were in unison in identifying the availability of cheap power in bulk as the attraction that lured them to Iligan.

From 1962 to 1979, more industries came to put up and operated their factories in Iligan and its immediate environs, like Balo-i, Lanao del Norte and Lugait, Misamis Oriental, which share common boundary with the city. Those plants are located outside Iligan are still tied to the Maria Cristina power source and the city’s economy.

Employment opportunities offered by several industrial firms in Iligan and immediate environs attracted a large number of in-migrants to the city. They were skilled and semi-skilled workers and professionals from all corners of the archipelago very much unlike the pre-1950 migrants who came exclusively from one or two places of origin such as Cebu and Bohol. The later arrivals settled in the city's urban commercial and urban-industrial barangays.

     

Major Industries

Platinum Group Metals Corp. Buru-un, Iligan City	Refractories Corp. of the Phils. Mapalad, Dalipuga, Iligan City
Mabuhay Vinyl Corporation Assumption Heights, Iligan City	SMC-Iligan Coconut Oil Mill  Sta. Felomina, Iligan City
Iligan Cement Corporation Kiwalan, Iligan City	Granexport Manufacturing Corporation Kiwalan, Iligan City
PILMICO Foods Corporation Kiwalan, Iligan City	Filipinas Eslon Mftg. Corporation San Roque, Iligan City
Global Steelworks Philippines, Inc. Suarez, Iligan City	Treasure Steelworks Corporation Nunucan, Ma. Cristina, Iligan City
FSC Metal Corporation Matab-ang, Dalipuga, Iligan City	Petronas Energy Phils., Inc. Matab-ang, Dalipuga, Iligan City
Mindanao Generation (NPC) Maria Cristina, Iligan City	National Grid Corp. Philippines Maria Cristina, Iligan City

The growth and development of a city, like Iligan for that matter, are subject to various policies in addition to historical and physical factors. Although some of these policies are macroeconomic in nature and intent, such as trade and industrial policies, others are local in nature. These have mainly to do with planning and management of the city such as provision for infrastructure and social services. Physical factors like Iligan's geographical advantage and natural resources endowments can provide advantage but are not sufficient for urban development if good urban planning is wanting.