The House Committee on Energy is now finalizing the LPG Cylinder Replacement and Recovery Program, which would replace around 6 million LPG cylinders being used in Philippine households.
However, in a letter to House Committee on Energy Chairman Juan Miguel Arroyo, the LPG Refillers Association (LPGRA) appealed to the committee to “further study” the impact of the program to poor households.
Engr. Bernardo Bolisay, chairman and president of LPGRA, said the proposed LPG Cylinder Replacement and Recovery Program needs millions of pesos in government subsidy, which would replace around 6 million LPG cylinders, adding nothing has been mentioned about subsidy in the consolidated measures under House Bills 302, 5642 and 7251, which are all pending in the committee.
Under the proposals, Bolisay said substandard LPG cylinders would have to be replaced in three years.
“That is not possible,” Bolisay said. He noted that a similar program took three years to replace 1.2 million cylinders in Thailand.
“In Thailand, the government subsidizes such a program so consumers don’t have to suffer,” he said.
Without a subsidy some 6 million poor families would have to shoulder the expense of a brand-new cylinder, which costs around P1,500.
The group, meanwhile, proposed a longer transition period for the program, which, he said, may take six years and three months under the present circumstances.
He said the two cylinder manufacturers can only produce 40,000 cylinders each per month for a total of 80,000 cylinders per month.
“At that rate, replacing 6 million cylinders would entail six years and three months,” he said.
“The recovery and replacement of these six million substandard LPG cylinders undoubtedly need the active cooperation of our poorest and poor Filipino families by surrendering their substandard LPG cylinders in order to be replaced by new standard LPG cylinders,” Bolisay said.
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