Recently, Ministry of Commerce released Company List of Export Quota Declaration for Rare Earth and Coke 2012, according to which, there were merely 11 companies got approval among 32 rare earth companies, and the other 21 companies including Inner Mongolia Baotou Steel Rare-earth were under the status of pending approval.

A sudden increase of the number of enterprises under pending is mainly due to the impact of environmental inspection. Many companies do not pass the verification of Environmental Protection inspection. There are more than 300 enterprises in rare earth industry in china, but the overall level of environmental protection is low, environmental pollution and ecological destruction are very prominent. Therefore, the state has repeatedly carried out strong measures.

Among the 21 companies pending approval, except 3 circulation enterprises, the other 18 companies engaged in rare earth smelting & separating and metal smelting need to meet the environmental protection requirements to get export quota for 2012. If the Ministry of Environmental Protection doesn’t release the new list of enterprises that meet environmental protection standards when the Ministry of Commerce announces the first export quota for rare earth, then, there will be no more than 20 enterprises that have rare earth export quota in the first half year of 2012.

List of Enterprises Approved to Have Rare Earth Export Quota in China, 2012

Source: Ministry of Commerce; ResearchInChina