Lithium carbonate has been widely applied not only in battery, glass, ceramics, chemicals, lubricants and pharmaceutical, etc industries, but also in synthetic rubber, dyes, semiconductor and most advanced industries. The global lithium carbonate market has an exceedingly high concentration degree. In 2008, SQM accounted for 30% market shares, Chemtall 28% and the USA-based FMC 19%. However, the accumulated share of Chinese manufacturers was only 22%. In 2009, the concentration degree of the industry improves further.

China salt lake brine lithium reserves rank 3rd in the world, and its lithium ore resources rank 4th. The rich lithium resources provide resources guarantee for the development of China lithium carbonate industry. Although the exploitation and utilization of lithium reserves started late in China and both of its lithium carbonate market scale and output are lower than those of the world’s top three manufacturers, its market development has huge potentials and it will be the major capacity releasing region of the globe in the future.

China’s lithium carbonate import growth has slowed down since 2005, and its import quantity’s absolute value has declined year by year. During Q1-Q3, 2009, China totally imported 1,805.6 tons of lithium carbonate, down 45.2% year on year, indicating that China’s lithium carbonate production has reached certain scale with less reliance on imports, and China started to export product in numbers to the overseas market.

During Q1-Q3 2009, China totally exported 1,417.5 tons of lithium carbonate, down 31.3% year on year, because, on the one hand, China started to restrict the export of resource products, and on the other hand, the domestic market has not gone out of downturn, and the demand is weak. China’s lithium carbonate export destinations are mainly Europe and Asia. From Q1 to Q3 of 2009, China’s lithium carbonate exports to Japan, Italy, the Netherlands and South Korea accounted for 66.52% of the total.

The report includes eight parts: overview of the lithium carbonate industry, global and China lithium carbonate market supply and demand pattern, China lithium carbonate import & export, product price trend, industry competition pattern as well as industry opportunities & risks. It also analyzes 14 key players such as SQM, FMC, CITIC Guoan, Tibet Mineral Development Co., Ltd, etc, describing their development in recent years (especially in 2009), lithium carbonate business development and updates in details. It tries to catch the developments of the industry and grasp the market future trends through the research of the lithium carbonate industry status quo.