On the 13th, China received requests for consultation on export management measures for rare earth, tungsten, and molybdenum proposed by the United States, the European Union, and Japan under the WTO dispute settlement mechanism. The person in charge of the Division of Treaty and Law of the Ministry of Commerce stated in a speech on this point that the Chinese policy goal is to protect resources and environment and achieve sustainable development, and there is no intention to protect domestic industries by distorting trade. The rare earth metals, tungsten, and molybdenum involved in the lawsuit are all rare metals. They are widely used in metallurgy, machinery, chemical engineering , aerospace and other fields. They belong to non-renewable precious resources and are listed by China as goods subject to export quota license management. “The act of the United States taking the lead in litigation can be said to be expected,†said Tu Xinquan, deputy dean of the WTO Research Institute of the University of International Business and Economics. Now that the U.S. economy is still recovering slowly, this year is again in the election year, when the lawsuit is provoked. There are both economic and political considerations. Of the 100 million tons of rare earth reserves that have been proven globally, China accounts for 36%. But for a long time, China has supplied more than 90% of the world's rare earth market. The United States and other Western countries, which are rich in rare earth resources, do not mine their own rare earths, but import large amounts of rare earths from China. China has paid a huge environmental price for the extraction of rare earths. The chemical processes that separate rare earths produce large amounts of pollutants and cause great damage to the environment. It is said that in the south of Weinan, where only rare earth resources are abundant, it is estimated that the capital investment will be as high as 38 billion yuan or more if ecological restoration of the land destroyed by minerals such as rare earths is to be carried out. In view of the scarcity of rare earth resources and the serious pollution to the environment, China has adopted a series of measures to strengthen the management of rare metals, including the management of rare earth mining, production and processing, and the corresponding management no longer adopts a single trade policy. It is through industrial policies and environmental protection measures that more comprehensively regulate domestic production, consumption, and export of rare earths, including quota management of exports. At the end of January this year, the WTO appeal panel confirmed that China’s restrictions on the export of nine industrial raw materials such as bauxite and coke violated the trade rules. According to the WTO commitments, China can adopt measures to impose export tariffs on products of 84 tariff lines. As the nine kinds of industrial raw materials involved are not included, China has defended the export tariff and export quota measures in question citing the protection of the exempted natural resources exception clause in Article 20 of the GATT. However, from the report of the Appellate Body, this has not been supported by the expert group and the Appellate Body. “Rare-earth and molybdenum-related products are not part of the 84 taxable products subject to the WTO's commitment to impose export duties. Only one tariff line number for tungsten products is included. From this point of view, the results of this lawsuit are uncertain.†Li Chenggang, head of the Law Division, said in an interview with Xinhua News Agency on the 13th. Despite this, Tu Xinquan also pointed out that the WTO rules did not completely negate export quotas, but citing the exhaustion of natural resource exemption clauses must meet certain conditions, that is, while restricting exports, domestic restrictions must also be imposed. The three products targeted by the lawsuit, especially rare earth and tungsten, have been relatively stringent in China's domestic management and have been listed on the list of protective mining products. China's defense in this respect is still promising. In terms of rare earth supply, China currently has the same standards and amounts for Chinese companies and foreign companies and treats them based on the same policy. From January to November 2011, China exported a total of 14,750 tons of rare earths, which accounted for only 49% of the total annual export quotas. A large number of export quotas were not used. The main reason was that prices increased by a large margin and users preferred alternatives and reduced demand. . “Our protection of the environment and resources and the justification for maintaining sustainability were repeatedly confirmed by the WTO expert group in previous cases.†Li Chenggang emphasized that China’s management of raw material exports is conducted in accordance with WTO rules and will continue. In accordance with the requirements of the multilateral trade rules, strengthen and improve the protection measures for the available natural resources. "The trade friction between China and the United States has increased this year, but it is less likely to evolve into a trade war. China will actively respond to it through multilateral, bilateral, and other means," said Li Chenggang. Aluminium Gas Cylinder,Aluminium Alloy Gas Cylinder,Seamless Aluminium Gas Cylinders,Aluminum High Pressure Gas Cylinder Jiangsu Minnuo Group Co., Ltd , https://www.minnuocylinder.com
Rethinking the issue of rare earths and foreign trade