China Building Materials Industry - From 2000 to 2005 Summary Report

Edited by Eric Chen

All the results in the articles are based on, and calculated from, data obtained in China Buidling Materials Newspaper.

Highlights:
Steady growth
From 2000 to 2005, average annual growth rate in building materials industry in China was 16.7%. During this period, the annual sales of cement increased steadily with an average rate of 12.6%, compared to 14.7% in the increase of sales for plate glass.

Regional imbalance
In the buidling materials industry, the average annual growth rates during 2000 and 2005 in the east, middle and west part of the country were 18.9%, 11.3% and 14.9% respectively. The coastal area still has a faster growth rate. However, the fixed-asset investments in middle and west part of China increased 51.3% and 49% respectively, compared to 36.6% in the coastal part.

Alterations in different sectors
Although those of cement, float glass and tiles are still prominent sectors in the building materials industry in China, new sectors such as those of cement products, engineering glass, fiberglass, construction ceramics, construction marble and waterproofing have expanded their shares in the industry.

Forms of enterprises
Until 2005, private enterprises had shared 34.3 percent of the total industry's sales increase, while state-owned or collective-owned corporation had shared 22.2 percent.

Fixed-asset investment
The fixed-asset investment in this industry was hot, with an annual growth rate of 48.3 percent. During the 5-year period, the total investment was 347.9 billion RMB, large part of which had been used for imported technology and facilities. For example, in 2005, output of new dry-process cement took 39.7 percent of the output of nationwide cement; output of float glass got 81.1 percent of all the flat glass production; output of direct-melt fiberglass took 57.5 percent of all the fiberglass production.

Rapidly-Growing Export
Export of building materials from China grew fast, maintaining the annual growth rate of 27.7%. In 2005, the number of destination countries was 213, compared to 180 in 2000. The trade amount with 22 countries, compared to 5 in 2000, exceeded 100 million US$.

Growing production efficiency
In 2005, among the building materials enterprises, producing 10.000 RMB goods consumed 6.67 tons standard coal equivalent energy, compared to 10.03 tons in 2000.
(to be continued)

An Unexpected Trap - About an Waterproofing Exhibition in Nanjing, China

by Eric Chen, sep. 19, 2006

Noticed that a waterproofing exhibition called Nanjing Waterproofing Exhibtion 2006 will be held in these days in Nanjing, I contacted an organizer for more detail information. The location of this organzer, which is in Wuxi instead of in Nanjing, looks a little bit weird. But anyway, a person of the company sent me a fax with a layout of the stands of all the exhibitors in this waterproofing exhibition.

Taking no doubt on this fax and the layout on it, I took the high speed train from Shanghai to Nanjing, spent more than two hours on the way, and arrived at the city quite on time. Without any difficulty, I hailed a taxi and got to the Nanjing Exhibition Center, in which the waterproofing exhibition should locate.

But actullay, all is a trap to me. The organizer cheated me with forged information. To my surprise, in the exhibition hall, I found no one of the companies listed on the fax the organizer provided. So I went up to the service desk and checked what hell the problem was. Frustrating again, the staffs of the exhibition center were absolutely not professional and accountable. Mading up my mind to kick the whole things out, I finally found the person who was willing to explain the operation of this exhibition to me. The chief organizer, Nanjing Exhibition Center, outsourced and subcontracted the marketing and sales to three exhibition services companies, one of them Wuxi. Some of these companies split the whole exhibition into several exhibitions for specialized industries, such as building materials industry, digital media industry, and machinery industry, making each of them sound like a whole and independent trade show with some important companies or organizations on the list.

Clearly, this kind of subcontracting undermines the reputation and liability of Nanjing Expo Center and even the city Nanjing. Visitors, some of which could be potential exhibitors in the future will definetely lose interest. The lack of control taken by the head organizer to its service providers does halm the whole business in the future.

Ironically, the person who tried to round up his explanation and story obviously know the problem and could address it to prevent such kind of loss. Unfortunetely, he didn't.

This is an vivid example about how the economy misses the chances to improve the productivity. At least, the Wuxi company benefits from this deal, whereas majority of the economy and society lose.

Admittedly, this exhibition is still something. You can still see visitors surrounding the products they have interest in and asking details and prices. However, without the qualified manage team, the trade show will quite certainly remain a local one and lose in the competition with those in Shanghai. Maybe you can see government touting its investment parks and incentives in front of their international counterpart, but without an efficient and prosperous local economy, most of the people will continue to be kept working and gain little.

Waterproofing Situation in Yunnan Province - China Waterproofing Highlights

Waterproofing Situation in Yunnan Province
Aug. 2006, Kunming
(compiled and composed by Eric J. Chen)

The Waterproofing Association of Yunnan (south-west province of China) carried out a general study, from January 2005 to July 2005, on the status of waterproofing in construction in the province. The survey covered seven major cities of Yunnan. The subjects of the investigation are the waterproofing projects finished from 2000 to 2004. Two main parts of the investigation lie in the quality of project and the materials used. Waterproofing quality of roofing system, basement, bathroom and kitchen, and external wall are main concerns during the investigation. In the first time, such a general and relatively entire look-into of the waterproofing projects in Yunnan was conducted.

Waterproofing quality of roofing system is improving in the province. Among the total 435 projects, the leakage rate, when calculated in area, is 0.85%, and is 15.4% when calculated in number of projects. The leakage rate of Kunming, the capital city, is still high with a rate of 14.7%, the report said. On the roofs, calculated in area, over 61% of the projects used roofing membrane, compared to 32% of those used coating and 7% powders or other materials.

In the aspect of basement waterproofing quality, some 35 projects were studied in the surveying, with a leakage rate of 22.9%. Among these projects, calculated in area, some 62% used roofing membrane, some 38% used coating materials, and the rest took no waterproofing measure.

Among bathroom and kitchen waterproofing projects, the leakage rate is 2.1%. Some 26% of the projects used roofing membrane and some 74% used coating materials. Concerning the tight space in bathroom and kitchen, the use of coating materials, most acrylic acid or polymer modified cementitious waterproofing coating, is more popular.

External wall waterproofing has not been introduced in most among those surveyed in the study. Most of the construction used ceramic tiles or other wall-covering bricks, leading to a considerable leakage situation in this rainy region. Among the few projects having waterproofing, coating materials were used, some imported.

The major part roofing membranes projects used is SBS roofing membrane and PVC roofing membrane

The report said that the quality of the waterproofing had been increased in the last 15 years. The leakage rate decreased from over 50% to about 15% or even 1% after remediation.

As a common phenomenon, lack of regulation effort of the market and the fierce competition among manufacturers lead to low price of the waterproofing materials, whereas the raw materials price keeps growing ranged from asphalt to resin. The market full of counterfeit goods and the contractors without sufficient skilled waterproofing workers are the other two pullbacks of the industry.

Firestone Holds Semilar in Beijing for its Roofing System - China Waterproofing Highlights

Firestone Holds Semilar in Beijing for its Roofing System
2006.8, Beijing
(compiled and translated by Eric J. Chen)

Philip Moors, Firestone's manager from its Asia contraction products division, held a semilar in Beijing in August, introducing Firestone's EPDM roofing system and padding system. Firestone's TPO roofing application, case stud in China and globe, waterproofing system and Firestone's technical service were also parts of the seminar. Obviously, this is part of the Firestone's marketing effort in China.