Chinese raw iron ore output totals 116.96 million mt in July

August12,2011

According to the National Bureau of Statistics of China, in July this year raw iron ore production in China totaled 116.96 million mt, indicating a month-on-month decrease of 5.7 percent and a year-on-year increase of 21.7 percent. Meanwhile, in the January-July period of this year raw iron ore production in China totaled 691.918 million mt, a year-on-year increase of 21.9 percent.

In July of the current year, coking coal production in China totaled 37.207 million mt, with a month-on-month decrease of two percent and a year-on-year increase of 19.8 percent. In the January-July period of this year, domestic coking coal production totaled 24.7564 million mt, showing a year-on-year increase of 12.8 percent.

China has 50 coal cos with output over 10Mt

Mar 7, 2011

There were 50 coal companies with annual production above 10 million tonnes in China, according to the latest data issued by the National Bureau of Statistics.

During the period from 2006 to 2010, these companies produced 1.73 billion tonnnes coal, or over 50 percent of the country’s total, said the bureau.

China closed 9000 small coal mines and phased out 450 million tonnes of backward production capacity in the past five years, it noted.

The country produced a total of 3.24 billion tonnes coal in 2010, increasing 1.4 times from 2005, the bureau added. (en.sxcoal)

Macroeconomic indicators - Caution as economy overtakes Japan

Friday, 18 Feb 2011

China Daily reported that China still has a long way to go to improve its economy despite formally overtaking Japan as the world's second largest economy.

Japan Cabinet Office said Japan gross domestic product reached USD 5.47 trillion last year compared to USD 5.88 trillion for China

Mr Lu Zhengwei senior economist with the Shanghai-based Industrial Bank said "It is not a surprise that China overtook Japan.” However, economists pointed out that China per capita GDP was only about 10% of Japan.

Mr Yi Xianrong economist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences a top think tank said "We should not overestimate our GDP figure as China population is 1.3 billion, 10 times bigger than Japan."

Mr Ma Jiantang head of the National Bureau of Statistics said in January that the country has a huge population, a weak economic foundation, few resources and many people are mired in poverty.

He said that "Therefore, while we take note of our expanding economic size and strength, we should also soberly understand that China remains a developing nation."

The China Youth Daily described China expansion as an empty happiness as the country economic development was at the expense of cheap labor and environmental degradation while the quality of life including education, social security and healthcare, still lags far behind developed countries.

Mr Yuan Gangming research fellow at the Center for China in the World Economy at Tsinghua University said that in the next three to five years China is likely to maintain a growth rate between 8% and 10%.

He said that however for an improved quality of life and healthy, sustained growth, the country must invest more in areas such as human resources, the underdeveloped western regions and social security.

Mr Zheng Xinli permanent vice-chairman of China Center for International Economic Exchanges also said the country should continue its reforms and improve its economic structure to avoid the middle-income trap

He said that "In the past 30 years, China developed because of reform and opening-up. In the coming two decades, we need more reforms to further unleash the potential of development. He predicted urbanization will be the biggest driving force for China's economy.”

He added that one person moving into a city can create economic value of CNY 100,000. In the next 10 years, 200 million Chinese people will move into cities and towns with a potential to add CNY 20 trillion to the economy over the decade.

(sourced:China Daily)
Tags:Macroeconomic indicators,economy overtakes Japan,Shanghai, China per capita GDP,Chinese Academy of Social Sciences,National Bureau of Statistics

China’s HRC output soars in 2010 on capacity boost

Monday, Feb14, 2011

The boost in hot rolled coil capacity witnessed in China through 2009~2010 prompted the country’s HR coil and sheet output last year to surge to 144.63m tonnes, according to National Bureau of Statistics data. This was up by a significant 25.93mt or 22% from 2009’s 118.7mt.

Steel Business Briefing notes that, in 2010 alone, a combined 14m tonnes/year of new HRC capacity was brought on stream, and this year a further 6m t/y will be commissioned. Indeed, China’s HRC output will continue climbing this year in any case as those newly-started hot strip mills gradually reach full operation.

Remarkably however, though HRC output is trending upwards, HRC prices have also climbed since early last September – driven both by Chinese inflationary pressure and by increasing raw materials costs.

Among Shanghai dealers for example, Q235 5.5mm HRC prices have reached RMB 4,780/t ($729/t) with 17% VAT, or RMB 4,085/t without VAT, up almost RMB 800/t from last September.

And because HRC supplies to the domestic market this month will be temporarily affected by maintenance stoppages at some mills, prices will likely climb further after traders resume business on 9 February after the Chinese New Year break.

For example, northern China’s Anshan Iron & Steel will lose about 250,000 tonnes of pig iron output this month due to blast furnace maintenance, denting HRC output as a result. Maintenance on one of its hot strip mills this month will lose east China’s Shagang about 300,000 t of HRC output. Angang and Shagang have informed their trading agents that their February HRC deliveries will only be 35% and 28% of contracted volumes respectively.
(sourced:SAC International Steel,Inc.)

China largest energy users boost efficiency by 20pct

Saturday, 05 Feb 2011
Bloomberg reported that China energy intensive industries cut consumption per unit of gross domestic product by more than 20% from 2006 to 2010.
Xinhua said citing the National Bureau of Statistics said Industries including oil processing, coking, nuclear-fuel processing, chemical manufacturing, smelting and electricity production saved a total of 400 million tonnes of standard coal, contributing more than 60% of the nation energy savings
Xinhua said the industries account for 77% of China industrial energy consumption and more than half the country total energy consumption.
An official from China National Development and Reform Commission in December said China will meet its target of cutting energy use per unit of GDP by 20% from 2006 to the end of 2010.(sourced:Bloomberg)

China 2010 steel output underreported - Macquarie

Thursday, 03 Feb 2011
According to Macquarie Research, Chinese crude steel output may have been under reported by 13 million tonnes in 2010 by failing to include small steel mills especially in the country's steel heartland of Hebei province.
Macquarie said annual production capacity of 24 million tonnes in the third quarter of last year and 27 million tonnes in the fourth quarter was excluded from full year steel production figures which should have reached 640 million tonnes.
Data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed China produced a record 627 million tonnes of steel last year.

Mr Luo Bingsheng, deputy chairman of the China Iron & Steel Association warned in late October that regional governments and enterprises could be misreporting their output figures.
Macquarie said CISA representing 77 medium and large sized Chinese steel mills said its Hebei based members produced 10.4 million tonnes of crude steel in December but the NBS put the figure at 9.2 million tonnes for the whole province.
Macquarie said "China demand for iron ore is almost 20 million tonnes higher in 2010 than what was implied using the NBS data, adding that this partly contributed to strong iron ore prices over the final quarter of last year.”

Based on its revised figures, Macquarie forecast a modest eight per cent growth in steel production this year, supported by demand from the manufacturing sector, bringing output to 690 million tonnes.(sourced:businessspectator.com.au)