China needs to expand aluminium consumption opportunities within and outside country: CNIA Division Chief

Mo Xinda, division chief of China Nonferrous Metals Industry Association (CNIA), pointed out at SMM Al-Si Summit on Thursday, December 6, that China would have to seek more opportunities to expand aluminium consumption domestically and abroad as trade disputes with the United States lowered aluminium product exports in 2018.

China, however, has a record of maintaining a trade surplus in aluminium materials exports since 2005, she added while addressing delegates at the SMM 2018 SMM Aluminium-Silicon Summit in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

2018 witnessed a significant plunge in aluminium products exports by China owing to trade disputes with the United States, which otherwise was the biggest destination of Chinese aluminium products in 2017, Mo said.

Chinese exports of aluminium foil to the US in October 2018 stood at 5,451 tonnes, compared to 21,000 tonnes in May 2017, which marked a drop by 74.2 per cent, she cited customs data. Higher US tariffs on Chinese goods, according to her, simply diverted America’s aluminium products import route from China to Russia, Indonesia, and South Korea.

In October 2018, South Korea imported some 3,061 tonnes of aluminium plates, sheets, and strips (HS code 7606) from China, accounting for 10.5 per cent of South Korea’s monthly exports of the same products to the US, according to Mo.

She believes China needs to seek more opportunities to expand domestic demand, which accounts for some 90 per cent of the overall aluminium consumption. In recent years, demand grew gradually in sectors such as high-speed rail transport, take-away packaging, and electric bikes, she said.