Reportlinker.com announced that a new market research report is available in its catalog. The report, China refractory material product manufacturing industry, 2008-2009, is summarized below.

In the past three years, China’s annual output of refractory materials has grown steadily, accounting for nearly a half of the world total. The causes for this can be attributed to China’s resource and labor advantages, as well as strong domestic demand as a result of its ongoing nationwide economic construction.

China ranks first in the world in terms of consumption volume of refractory materials. Products are extensively used in most of the country’s large-scale basic industries like the steel, cement and glass industries, which are all very important or mainstay industries and have made great contributions to China’s national economy. Therefore, the refractory material industry also plays a very important role in China’s economy. As China’s economy grows rapidly, the refractory market has been boosted and the market need is expected to rise. In the forthcoming years, the market demand is set to keep high and consequently the industry is expected to rise until 2009.

Affected by macro regulation policies, China’s export of refractory materials in 2007 dropped by 39.2 percent compared with 2006. In the same year, refractory material import grew by 30.4 percent.

China has abandoned export tax rebates for most refractory raw materials, and will reduce the tax rebates for finished products. This indicates export of refractory materials is further limited, which will have impact on advanced countries which import most refractory raw materials and products from China. They have to move their factories to China to lower cost. As a result, China’s refractory industry will have a favorable development opportunity.

Also, due to high cost and more severe environmental restrictions, the refractory manufacturers in developed countries have to transfer the production of bulk and labor-intensive products to developing countries. China undoubtedly has more opportunities thanks to rich raw materials and low labor cost.

Compared with other industries, the investment returns in the refractory manufacturing industry is rather high. It has risen sharply ever since 2003, particularly in the period of 2006-2007, and is expected to continue this rising trend in the coming years.

Investment opportunities in refractory material product manufacturing industry can be considered in:

  • Long-life-span and low-consumption refractory materials for ladles;
  • Highly efficient refractory materials for continuous casting and continuous rolling;
  • Refractory materials for refining furnace;
  • High performance unshaped refractory materials;
  • Refractory materials suitable with new manufacturing methods;
  • High performance refractory materials for key equipments used in cement, nonferrous metal, petro-chemical and ceramics industries; and
  • Environmentally and ecologically friendly refractory materials.