WTO litigation, defeat, rare earth export control or end

A year and a half of the China Rare Earth International Lawsuit has been heard on October 26, and the interim report completed by the World Trade Organization (WTO) Dispute Settlement Expert Group is said to support the United States, Japan and the EU in violation of China’s rare earth export restrictions. The appeal. The failure of the Rare Earth International Lawsuit means that China will be forced to adjust China's existing rare earth export quota policy and rare earth export tariffs, and China's rare earth export control may end.

According to media reports, the Interim Report of the Expert Group on the Rare Earth Dispute (Interimreport) has been sent to the parties to the dispute, and the final report may be officially released after 6-8 weeks. Up to now, the rare earth management departments and industry organizations such as the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the China Rare Earth Association have not confirmed the above news to the outside world.

However, the reporter learned that in the face of the unfavorable situation of international litigation, the management department is already considering replacing the terminal control with one-size-fits-all and chasing the interception with more flexible and reasonable policies, such as emphasizing the role of improving the mandatory production plan by means of market allocation. The transfer payment compensates the rare earth resources and reduces the power of the rare earth resources in violation of mining and super-production.

Worry of losing

In March 2012, the United States, Japan and the European Union successively filed a trade dispute lawsuit with the WTO, arguing that China imposed restrictive measures on export quotas and export taxes for 17 rare earths and tungsten and molybdenum. After the bilateral consultations failed, in September 2012, the WTO Director-General formed an expert group to decide. Prior to this, the WTO in 2011 had ruled that China's export restrictions on nine raw materials such as bauxite, coke and magnesium were in violation of WTO rules.

"Once China has lost the lawsuit, the rare earth industry may suffer from the "disaster". China's rare earth export system will be adjusted. The quota system and export tariffs will be released under pressure, but the structure is chaotic and concentrated. Low, smuggling and trafficking will rise." On October 31, Wei Qining, a researcher in the metallurgical industry of CIC, told this reporter that if the internal environment has not been improved, forced to open to the outside world will inevitably exacerbate the industry's predicament.

Data show that from January to August this year, China's rare earth mines and smelting industry achieved a main business income of 45 billion yuan, down 14.9% year-on-year, and the import and export trade volume of rare earth products was 1.4 billion US dollars, down 39.4% year-on-year. From January to August this year, the rare earth mine and smelting industry realized a profit of only 3.2 billion yuan, down 62.1% year-on-year.

Once the quota system is liberalized, tariffs will fall, and the volume of rare earth import and export trade will inevitably increase. This is good for companies that rely on the survival of rare earth trade. In the framework of China's rare earth industry, trade companies have been questioned, relying on the current The corruption caused by the rare earth export quota system is also concentrated in the trade link. During the period from the end of 2010 to the mid-2011 period when the price of rare earth soared, the rare earth export quota index rose from 50,000 yuan per ton to 500,000 yuan per ton, with the export quota index gradually increasing. Leaning to the production enterprises, coupled with the ignorance of the rare earth market, the current quota indicators are basically unattended.

According to data provided by Jia Yinsong, director of the Rare Earth Office of the Raw Materials Division of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, 1,594 companies across the country have issued special invoices for rare earths. In theory, industry authorities and tax authorities can track the production and circulation of all rare earths, thereby managing the illegal rare earth industry chain, and can also eliminate some of the excess capacity.

However, the reporter learned that there are only over 200 Chinese smelting and separating enterprises on the books, that is to say, there are a large number of trading companies on the list of special invoice enterprises. This also means that a large number of rare earth special invoices may flow to non-registered manufacturing companies.

A rare earth trader from Dongguan, Guangdong, told reporters that they have “smelled” the change from foreign customers. “Many customers with long-term needs are considering delaying orders. If export quotas are cancelled, they will have many The price of the inquiry will definitely decrease."

At present, the Chinese government has not disclosed the progress of the rare earth litigation. According to the dispute settlement procedure, the expert group will hold separate meetings with the parties within two weeks to review the aforementioned interim report. If China is dissatisfied with the report of the expert group, it still has the right to the WTO. The Appellate Body filed an appeal.

At the "2013 China Rare Earth Forum" held on October 26, Wang Qinhua, vice president of China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association and vice president of China Rare Earth Industry Association, said that "the WTO litigation involving rare earths is nearing completion, and the elimination of rare earth export quota management is also It will be mentioned on the agenda after the case is over, and it is recommended to start with light rare earths first."

Excess "disease"

As a policy implemented since 1998, rare earth export quota management is regarded as a temporary arrangement in the eyes of many people in the industry. They believe that when the domestic production order is standardized and environmental protection is completed, it can be cancelled.

It is understood that after nearly five years of integration, the current top ten enterprises in China's rare earth enterprises, the production capacity of mineral products has accounted for 81% of the country's total capacity, smelting separation capacity accounted for 61.5%.

But unfortunately, the above-mentioned governance results are not enough to allow the export quota policy to be withdrawn after 15 years of implementation, because the rare earth black industrial chain is still popular, so that the country’s annual mandatory production plan cannot be implemented, and the rare earth supply exceeds demand. The situation has been difficult to change.

According to the data provided by Wang Qinhua, the current smelting and separation capacity of rare earths in China is over 400,000 tons, and the global demand is 120,000 tons. According to static figures, the operating rate is less than 30%. On the general rare earth materials, the permanent magnet alloy material has a capacity of 250,000 tons and the output is only 80,000 tons; the hydrogen storage alloy material has a capacity of 30,000 tons and the output is only 12,500 tons; in the field of new materials, there are nearly 200 NdFeB enterprises. Only 20 of the output reached more than 1,000 tons.

The above-mentioned traders from Dongguan had previously engaged in the rare earth downstream industry. Because of the market downturn, he told this reporter that after the decline in rare earth prices in 2011, the downstream industry that was originally “hungry” soon changed from “satisfaction” to surplus. It is. This simultaneous excess of upstream and downstream has kept the price of rare earths at a low level for nearly a year and a half.

Wang Qinhua believes that an important factor in the price fluctuation of rare earths is the repeated breeding of the black industry chain. She said that the illegal exploitation of rare earth mines in China is about 40,000 tons, and the super-index of smelting separation or the production of no indicators is 50,000 tons. Left and right, the smuggling amount of rare earth is about 20,000 tons, which seriously interferes with the normal production and circulation order of rare earth. Ma Rongzhen, secretary-general of China Rare Earth Industry Association, pointed out in August this year that more than 70% of the ion ore obtained by the southern separation and smelting enterprises is unknown.

Source control

In the past five years of rare earth integration, Minmetals, Chinalco, China National Mining and China Steel Research have strengthened cooperation with localities and enterprises in Shandong and Hunan. At the provincial level, Inner Mongolia, Jiangxi, Guangdong, Fujian and Sichuan and other regions and enterprises have intensified their mergers and acquisitions and achieved phased results.

In the above activities, due to the coordination of interests between the central and local, regional and regional, rare earth resources have become the focus of competition, and have become the bargaining chip for many local governments and settled enterprises. This subtle game also For the illegal mining and super-planning production, the ban has not only buried the "seeds", but it is also reasonable to solve the problem of overcapacity.

When talking about the deep-seated problems of the rare earth industry on October 26, Jia Yinsong pointed out that some enterprises illegally exploited the law and selected rare earths for the purpose of iron selection and recycling. "The regulatory responsibilities of some regions are not implemented, and the acquiescence of super-index mining is adopted. attitude."

Wang Qinhua said that because China's distribution of rare earth resources is mostly located in the poor and old areas, the economic development is relatively backward, and overcapacity is also a consequence of local governments' hopes to develop local economy through the development and utilization of rare earth resources.

"When the state formulates the policy of rare earth resource development and industrial development, it should pay attention to the rational layout of the region, properly handle the relationship between the central and local governments, and the current and long-term relationship. It is necessary to explore the establishment of a rare earth resource protection mechanism and a supporting interest compensation mechanism. Payment and other methods will compensate the regions and enterprises involved in resource protection," said Wang Qinhua.

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