San Fernando, Pampanga—An estimated 448 products in Central Luzon were certified as Bagwis in compliance with the Philippines National Standard, the Department of Trade and Industry said Friday.
The Bagwis is a regional trade mark for DTI-Certified Establishments for Seal of Excellence of products based in the region.
If one is looking for excellent and safe products, look for a Bagwis trademark coming from any seven provinces of Central Luzon, including Aurora.
Judith Angeles, DTI regional director in Central Luzon said the awardees who received the seal of excellence for their products include Bulacan, 97; Pampanga, 82; Tarlac, 77; Bataan,75; Nueva Ecija 66; Zambales,48; and Aurora, 21.
Those who received the seal of excellence were mostly gold, bronze and silver, Angeles said.
The awardees received their certification during the 44th National Standard Week held last Friday at the office of the DTI at the government center here and attended by manufacturers and organizations. They include the Liquefied Petroleum Gas Marketers, Association of Sanitary Wares Association of Philippines, Steel Angles Shape and Sections Manufacturers, Philippines Association of Black Iron and Galvanized Iron Pipes and Tubes Manufacturers Inc. Philippines, Electric Wires Manufacturers Associations and other companies in the region.
Angeles said other products and business establishments included in the seal of excellence were food, restaurants, supermarkets shops, appliance stores, and non-food products.
She said that products underwent quality and audit tests conducted by the technical experts mostly engineers and personnel of the regional to protect consumers.
“We have to inspect products specially electrical products like christmas lights, imported lanterns to protect consumers specially in the coming holiday season”, Angeles said.
Norlito Tiglao, supervising trade and industrial specialist of the DTI in the region said that under the annual audit inspection, all products underwent three stages of inspection from the company, the regional office of the DTI and then Bureau of Philippine Standards (BPS).
According to Tiglao, the importance of products standard in our everyday cannot be overemphasized.
He said that “the fitness of mandatory products like construction materials, and appliances impact on our like, health and safety as end users of these products.
To ensure the quality of the products, the DTI will conduct routine or regular factory assessment wherein the manufacturers are audited vis-a-vis their quality management system and then products audits by testing the quality and safety of the products.
When the product is already in the market, the personnel of the Fair Trade and Enforcement Bureau will visit establishments to inspect the products being offered for sale, Tiglao said.
He said violators of the products standard is punishable with Php5,000 up to Php150,000 as administrative fine.
Aside from licensing and regulatory, DTI is also addressing issues on substandard products in the market,he added.”‹