Non-ferrous metals industry will grow slowly this year

The relevant person in charge of the Raw Materials Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology predicts that the growth in the production, consumption, and investment of the 10 non-ferrous metals will further slow down in 2015, and product prices will continue to be weak and oscillating, making it difficult for companies to operate.

The responsible person pointed out that the implementation of national strategies such as the “One Belt and One Road”, the coordinated development of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, and the Yangtze River Economic Belt will provide new growth drivers for the development of the non-ferrous metal industry, but pressure on the industry’s overcapacity is still high, and the cost pressure on enterprises is increasing. It will continue to grow slowly in 2015. At the same time, the implementation of the new “Environmental Protection Law” and the increase in the cost of resources, environment, labor, and other factors have also forced the nonferrous metals industry to shift from scale expansion to innovation as soon as possible.

In 2014, the growth rate of output of 10 non-ferrous metals in China declined, the investment structure was gradually optimized, the level of energy saving and consumption reduction was further improved, and positive progress was made in transformation and upgrading. According to statistics, last year's non-ferrous metal industry achieved an 11.4% increase in industrial value added compared with the same period of the previous year, and realized a main business income of 5702.5 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 8.6%.

“The pressure on industry overcapacity is still high.” According to the person in charge, the backward production capacity that should be eliminated from the existing 35 million tons of electrolytic aluminum production capacity is already small. The uncompetitive enterprises involved in local taxation and personnel resettlement during the shutdown process. Debt settlement, upstream and downstream industries and a series of issues, poor capacity exit channels, electrolytic aluminum excess pressure on production capacity. The person in charge said that in 2015, the existing power plants and electrolytic aluminum plants in the region will be encouraged to be vertically integrated according to the industrial chain, and in conjunction with the reform of the power system, research will be conducted to promote the fairness of electricity prices among network power, self-provided power, and local area networks, and to reverse some of the technological levels. The electrolytic aluminum enterprises with high and resourceful conditions have suffered long-term losses due to inequitable electricity prices.