OFWs no more: SteelAsia enlists construction veterans
There’s often little certainty for overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) about where the next contract will come from.
Crises such as the COVID-19 pandemic—and more recently, the conflict in the Middle East—could trigger mass layoffs, thus forcing thousands of Filipinos to return home with few job prospects waiting for them.
For a growing number of repatriated OFWs, that uncertainty has led them to an unlikely second career: helping build what SteelAsia Manufacturing Corp. hopes will become the country’s first integrated steel mill
SteelAsia currently employs 106 repatriated OFWs across its four plants in Calaca, Batangas; Meycauayan, Bulacan; Compostela, Cebu; and Davao City.
Many returned to the Philippines during the pandemic, when economic disruptions and lockdowns wiped out jobs across the globe.
“Some of the returning workers initially considered retirement after years overseas, especially older employees who were let go due to age,” the company says. “But many said the opportunity to work in a Philippine steel mill convinced them to return to the industry.”
This arrangement is particularly relevant today as the conflict in the Middle East continues to displace Filipino workers. According to the Department of Migrant Workers, more than 10,000 OFWs have already been repatriated from the region.
SteelAsia says the OFWs it has tapped for its Lemery plant in Batangas came mainly from Saudi Arabia, the top destination for Filipino workers abroad, which accounts for 74.5 percent of the country’s total overseas workforce. Many had also worked in Bahrain and other parts of the Middle East.
‘For our own nation’
What SteelAsia is entrusting these former OFWs with is the operation of its steel sections mill in Lemery.
A steel sections mill is an industrial rolling facility that transforms semifinished steel billets or blooms into finished structural steel products such as I-beams, H-sections, channel steel and angle bars—key materials used in buildings, heavy infrastructure and industrial projects.
Once operational later this year, the Lemery plant is expected to produce heavy steel sections that the Philippines currently imports entirely from abroad.
For the former OFWs, however, the opportunity is more than just another job.
“We’re like soldiers who used to fight for other countries and now are being asked to fight for our own nation,” says Romeo Serna, a stacker operator at SteelAsia.
For Cenen Reyes, another repatriated OFW, working at SteelAsia allows him to continue practicing a craft he spent years mastering overseas.
‘One last mission’
“My body is still craving for work that involves steel,” Reyes says.
SteelAsia expects its expansion plans to create at least 30,000 jobs in the coming years, either through direct employment or related industries.
This is part of the company’s broader expansion strategy, which includes four new manufacturing facilities by 2028 backed by a multiyear P75 billion investment. Once completed, these projects are expected to raise SteelAsia’s annual production capacity to 4.8 million tons from 2.5 million tons.
As SteelAsia pushes ahead with its expansion plans, the repatriated OFWs it has hired say they are also fulfilling a mission of their own.
“We feel like veteran soldiers being called to active duty for one last mission for SteelAsia,” says acting production head Antonio Rivera.
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