Do you think that
buying paper seems to be getting more and more expensive recently?
I often find that when I buy a large box of paper, the price is tens of dozens, it seems cheap, but when I get it,
I find that it is all mini version.
Isn’t this a disguised price increase?
In fact, the rise of the paper industry has become a reality.
On October 11, Nine Dragons Paper issued six price increase letters within one day. For a time, Luoyang paper was expensive.
Dongguan, Taicang, Tianjin, Quanzhou, Chongqing and Shenyang bases will implement new prices from October 13th and October 18th, and the products will generally increase by 50 - 150 /ton.
* Image source: China Paper Network
There have been signs of price increases.
During May and September this year, many paper companies issued multiple price increase letters. Among them, prices at Dongguan, Taicang, Quanzhou, Tianjin and other bases of Nine Dragons Paper increased by about 50-150 yuan/ton.
Information exploded all of a sudden. Some friends may not have reacted yet:
Nine Dragons Paper?
It’s okay if you don’t know, but do you know Chinese Zhang Yin ?
She is known as the richest man in China in waste paper.
In 2007, she ranked 390th on the "Forbes" global billionaire list, becoming the first richest woman in China at that time.
And Nine Dragons Paper was founded by her at that time.
At present, it is the second largest papermaking group in the world in terms of production capacity;
At the same time, it is also the leading papermaking enterprise in China, accounting for about 14% of China's total paper and cardboard production capacity.
This time, leading companies have taken the lead in raising prices, which means a general increase in the entire paper price market. Why does
keep increasing its price?
From the price increase letter, it can be seen that due to "the rising prices of various raw and auxiliary materials such as waste paper and coal", "costs continue to rise."
Therefore, it is also a "helpless move"!
After all, these past few years have been eventful.
Recently, by coincidence, we have encountered power shortages and production restrictions, which have affected the operating rate.
But the most important problem is the import of raw materials, which is caused by the epidemic resulting in reliance on imported pulp and insufficient supply of waste paper.
Imported pulp cannot keep up with everyone’s demand for paper, and supply is far less than demand. Doesn’t the price rise?
In fact, the paper industry has been importing waste paper in large quantities. According to public data, my country's cumulative waste paper pulp consumption in 2019 was 54.43 million tons, and imported waste paper pulp consumption was 24.09 million tons.
In other words, imported waste paper pulp consumption accounts for nearly 40% of the total waste paper pulp consumption.
This is half the time!
No, this is not scientific.
Think about it, growing up, the most I use is scratch paper. A book of mathematical scratch paper will die in less than a week.
If all of us high school students folded up the used draft paper, it would be at least as tall as the Eiffel Tower, right? Why do we need to import
?
If it doesn’t work, I took out all the scratch paper at home and donated it!
In fact, things are more complicated than we think.
Although this papermaking can use waste paper, isn't the most basic raw material still wood?
However, my country's forest coverage rate is not high.
At the end of 2020, my country's forest coverage rate was only 23.04%;
while Japan reached 64%, South Korea 61%, and Canada 44%.
Therefore, compared with the world's major pulp and paper-making countries with high forest coverage and abundant raw material resources,
my country's domestic forest coverage is low, and it loses at the starting line in terms of the most basic raw materials.
The second type is waste paper and other recycled fibers recycling.
Because forest resources are very limited and the concept of environmental protection is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, our country has begun to implement various measures in recent years to promote the reuse of waste paper. Therefore, uses waste paper and other recycled fibers as raw materials, which is currently the main way to make paper.
There is no doubt that the amount of waste paper in our country is huge, but the problem is that our country’s waste paper recycling rate is low, only 46.5%.
* Picture source screenshot of waste paper recycling in the global paper industry
Compared with the United States, the waste paper recycling rate has reached 66.2%, and Australia is as high as 77%.
China's low recycling rate means that a large amount of waste paper is wasted.
The low recycling rate is related to our failure to classify garbage properly. After all, the garbage is not sorted well, so how to recycle waste paper?
Compared with foreign countries, such as Japan, it goes without saying that its garbage classification is famous far and wide. There are very detailed classifications, and in some areas such as "Joyokozawa City" there are even as many as 70 categories. ;
has also established a complete legal system and system to ensure implementation. The perfect foreign waste classification system not only ensures the quantity of imported waste paper, but also ensures the quality.
As for imported waste paper, when the quality is guaranteed, the price is not much different from that of domestic waste paper.
This is related to the fact that my country’s waste material recycling system is not perfect yet and there are many waste paper acquisition links.
We often have this experience. When dealing with express boxes, if there are too many, we often accumulate them first. When passing by, we see people who specialize in collecting waste and sell them to them.
They often carry a huge woven sack and drag a pile of cardboard boxes behind their hands, walking slowly through the alleys;
These are often scavengers who take these waste products and sell cardboard at waste recycling points.
There are large and small waste recycling points, and small recycling points sell them to large recycling bins.
There are so many overall acquisition links and price increases at every level. No wonder the price of domestic waste paper is the same as that of imported waste paper.
You said the price is about the same, but the important thing is that the quality is not as good as others.
my country currently only recycles waste paper simply, and all kinds of waste paper are mixed together, resulting in uneven quality of recycled recycled pulp , and low-quality recycled pulp is difficult to use to make high-end cardboard and paper.
In addition, in 2011, the country canceled the preferential value-added tax refund policy for recycling waste paper resources , which also exacerbated this situation.
lacks unified quality requirements and supervision standards, which is also part of the reason.
To summarize, the import of waste paper is objectively due to the shortage of raw materials caused by my country’s forest coverage;
It is also due to domestic waste paper due to garbage classification, lack of standards, and overall industry non-standardization, resulting in high prices and uneven quality; and the quality Imported waste paper, which is stable and has similar prices, has undoubtedly become a better choice for paper manufacturers.
However, relying on imports is not a long-term solution. Just look at this epidemic and you will know how severe the impact will be.
Therefore, the country has been working hard to change the passive situation.
In April 2017, the Central Working Conference reviewed and approved the "Implementation Plan on Prohibiting the Entry of Foreign Garbage and Promoting the Reform of the Solid Waste Import Management System", which officially opened the curtain of solid waste import control.
* Picture source People’s Daily news screenshot
Subsequently, in the field of imported waste paper, the Ministry of Environmental Protection successively issued bans on the import of mixed waste paper, and improved the quality control standards of imported waste paper (impurity rate reduced to 0.5%), etc. A series of policy provisions.
Starting from 2021, China will completely ban the import of solid waste, The Ministry of Ecology and Environment will no longer accept import applications for solid waste.
Under a series of measures, the net import volume of waste paper dropped sharply from 28.4962 million tons in 2016 to 6.8913 million tons in 2020.
But let me tell you, these are not enough. After all, most of the people currently engaged in waste paper recycling in our country are individual and private enterprises.
Therefore, if these individual waste purchasers can be given some preferential policies , so that waste recycling can embark on the road of corporate management, this will further promote the standardization and standardization of waste paper recycling behavior.
In the era of resource shortage, I sincerely hope that my country’s waste paper can embark on the road of standardization and get better and better~
Reference:
China’s waste paper recycling rate has increased to 49% Consumer Daily Network
Waste paper recycling in the global paper industry Li Yufeng
China Paper Industry 2020 Report China Paper Association
Research on the Utilization of Waste Paper Regenerated Fiber and Biotechnology in Fiber Recycling Ma Zhijuan
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