Reuters – 5 hrs ago
BEIJING (Reuters) – China on Sunday set up a rare earth industry association, state media reported, in a move to speed up consolidation of its sprawling industry that has drawn fire for what overseas trade partners call unfair export quotas.
The association, with 155 members across the country, will report to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, which regulates rare earth production, the official Xinhua news agency said.
Baotou Steel Rare Earth in Inner Mongolia, Rising Nonferrous in Guangdong and China Minmetalsare among 13 heavyweight members, Xinhua said.
Su Bo, an industry vice minister, said Beijing wanted to shake up the industry by phasing out small smelters, giving big players a greater stake in the supply of rare earth metals and boosting environmental protection.
“China will continue to clean up the rare earth industry, expand rare earth environmental controls, strengthen environmental checks, and implement stricter rare earth environmental policies,” Su said.
Xinhua said the long-awaited body would promote international exchanges and help Chinese companies to handle trade disputes. China’s rare earth export quota is managed by China’s Ministry of Commerce.
The European Union, the United States and Japan complained to the World Trade Organisation last month that China is illegally choking off exports of rare earths to hold down prices for its domestic manufacturers and pressure international firms to move operations to China.
China accounts for about 97 percent of world output of the 17 rare earth metals crucial for the defence, electronics and renewable-energy industries and used in a range of products such as the iPhone, disk drives and wind turbines.
Beijing has said its export curbs are necessary to control environmental problems caused by rare earth mining and to preserve supplies of an exhaustible natural resource.
(Reporting by Zhou Xin and Michael Martina; Editing by Ron Popeski)
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I was thinking about all the negative press that comes out of china and is it really the case what we are told. It’s quite possible that we are not told the truth. I am talking about experience of some media and alternative media that totally told fairy stories about my husbands homeland and the only reason I knew was because of our links there plus he’s always there! So now I have a critical eye of everything I read and I do hope everyone else does as well because some people are just believing all this without bothering to check out if it is in fact authentic reporting, just my two cents though!
Thanks, Suzy. These are wise words. I find it a bit sad that we cannot trust our media. Hugs, ~Jean
Jean, before last February I use to go to the alternative news for my news and I left the western media but after that I read everything that was said about Libya and I realized something wasn’t right. I was lucky because I have so many contacts so I could just ask and find out about what actually was happening and what was the word on the streets. Now with our news I try to be as informed as I can and try to see the bigger picture but like I said many people believe everything as gospel. I am not so trusting anymore and like you I find it sad.
Best wishes,
Suzy.
““China will continue to clean up the rare earth industry, expand rare earth environmental controls, strengthen environmental checks, and implement stricter rare earth environmental policies,” Su said.”
Hmm, don’t know whether to laugh or cry to this one. China, the place that keeps opening up coal plants and stealing everyone elses minerals?