19 January 2017 — Department of Interior and Local Government (DILG) Secretary Ismael D. Sueno and Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) OIC Chief Superintendent Bobby V. Baruelo visited the headquarters and factory of Rosenbauer International AG in Austria from January 11 to 13 to inspect the prototype firefighting vehicle to be delivered to the Philippines from the Austrian firefighting manufacturer under Phase II of the DILG-BFP Austrian-assisted Capacity Building Program.

The first batch of deliveries is expected on March 2017. 

Secretary Sueno and his delegation met with officials from Rosenbauer, led by its CEO Dr. Dieter Siegel, and other officials from the Austrian Ministry of Finance and Oesterreichische Kontrollbank AG, Austria’s export credit agency.

Secretary Sueno expressed his satisfaction with the quality of Rosenbauer firefighting vehicles and explored the option of concluding another phase to supply some 300 municipalities that currently do not have firefighting vehicles.

The DILG-BFP Capacity Building Program is funded by the Austrian government through a mixed grant-loan package with Rosenbauer International AG as the contracted supplier. Rosenbauer is the world’s largest manufacturer of firefighting vehicles. END