No significant cut for rare earth quotas
CHINA S rare earth export quotas for 2011 will not be cut significantly from recent levels, a commerce official said yesterday, adding to the country s efforts to soothe foreign companies and governments worried about supply.
A Chinese Vice Minister of Commerce, Chen Jian, made the comments at a news conference. Chen s comment came after Vietnam and Japan, a major consumer of rare earth from China, agreed at an Asian regional meeting in Hanoi on Sunday to partner on mining the minerals in Vietnam.
Coal consumption to be about 4.2b tons
CHINA S primary energy consumption in 2015 will be between 4 billion and 4.2 billion tons of standard coal, Xinhua News Agency said, quoting Jiang Bing, director of the development and planning department of the National Energy Administration.
Primary energy consumption was 3.07 billion tons in 2009, 30 percent more than in 2005, and without controls may rise to 7 billion tons in 2030, Jiang said. Per-capita consumption is now 2.5 tons, he said. Consumption needs to be kept below 4.2 billion tons in the 2011-2015 five-year plan for the country to meet its targets of drawing 15 percent of energy needs from non-fossil fuels, and cutting emissions by unit of GDP by 40 to 45 percent, Xinhua reported.
2010 foreign trade about US$2.8 trillion
CHINA S 2010 exports and imports will rise 25 percent from a year earlier to about US$2.8 trillion, the Ministry of Commerce said in a statement on its Web site yesterday.
The country s outbound investment growth may slow in 2011, the ministry said in the statement.
Aircraft fleet to double in five years
THE country s civil aviation fleet will nearly double to 5,000 planes in five years, domestic media said Friday, as the nation pours money into its vast transportation system to meet surging demand.
The country is expected to have 4,800 to 5,000 aircraft to transport passengers and cargo by 2015, up from the current 2,600 planes, China Daily reported, quoting Li Jiaxiang, head of the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC). The civil aviation industry has been growing 17.2 percent annually since 1978, the report said. Airlines are facing rising competition from the country s rapidly expanding railway network, which offers travellers cheaper tickets and convenience with stations closer to city centers than most airports.
