It is understood that the Ministry of Commerce website announced at 8 a.m. today that it would suspend exports of natural sand to Taiwan from now on. Q: Some companies are concerned about whether there is any adjustment in the export policy of natural sand to Taiwan?

It is understood that the Ministry of Commerce website released a message at 8 a.m. today that it will suspend the export of natural sand to Taiwan from now on.

Question: Some companies are concerned about whether there is any adjustment to the export policy of natural sand to Taiwan? What is the Ministry of Commerce’s response to this?

Answer: According to relevant laws and regulations, it is decided to suspend the export of natural sand to Taiwan. The relevant measures will be implemented from August 3, 2022. The

message caused heated discussions on the Internet as soon as it came out. At the same time, the industry is concerned that in addition to seriously affecting Taiwan's construction industry, the move of the Ministry of Commerce may also have an impact on TSMC and other companies.

International e-commerce information learned that natural sand is mainly divided into mountain sand, sea sand, , river sand, and its uses are widely used, from glass, casting, ceramics and refractory materials, smelting ferrosilicon , metallurgy, construction, chemical industry, plastics, rubber, abrasives and filter materials and other industries.

. Mountain sand: The mountain sand in natural quartz sand is a relatively high-quality quartz sand, so it has many advantages and characteristics, including high hardness, large specific gravity, small edges and angles, uniform particles, natural color, etc. With these natural advantages, mountain sand is also specially used for the production of lawns in sports venues. Lawns made of high-quality mountain sand as raw materials can protect grass hairs, reduce lawn damage during use, thereby improving the service life of the lawn. Nowadays, many domestic colleges and universities use this lawn, and quartz sand is an ideal material for artificial fields such as modern track and field fields, football fields, golf courses, , etc.

. Sea sand: Because the characteristics of sea sand and mountain sand materials themselves are different, the industries used by the two are different. Sea sand is the main raw material for mechanical and cast molding sand. It can be made into sandblasting, hard abrasive paper , sandpaper, sand cloth and other abrasive materials, used to clean sand, remove rust, and remove the embryo and glaze of ceramics and refractory porcelain. can also be used as raw materials for high-silicon bricks, ordinary silicon bricks, silicon carbide , etc. required in the kiln, as well as raw materials or additives and fluxes for metallurgical silicon metals, ferrosilicon alloy , etc.
• , river sand : It is the cement standard sand that everyone sees in life. People who have seen houses at home or have been to construction sites and other places should know this material. It is the main raw material for construction, concrete, cementitious material , road construction materials, artificial marble and other materials. In addition, river sand is often used as a sand cleaning, rust removal, reinforcement, forming, stress removal, and surface cleaning and coating of various profiles in the fields of casting, forging machines, metallurgy, heat treatment, steel structure, frame structure, container, ship, construction, bridge, mining, etc.

  The global annual production capacity of polysilicon in 2021 is about 631,000 tons, and only a fraction of the chips are used to manufacture silicon. Silicon materials for semiconductors account for only 5% of the total production of all silicon materials. Compared with the construction industry, the semiconductor industry uses very small amount of silicon, but for Taiwan, it is no small matter to restrict the import of natural sand.

  data shows that more than 90% of Taiwan’s natural sand imports come from the mainland, while Taiwan’s chips account for 34.8% of Taiwan’s exports in 2021. Netizens said that the Ministry of Commerce suspended the export of natural sand to Taiwan, which is a 7-inch mark in Taiwan's semiconductor manufacturing industry.

  

  Among them, the most injured one is the "Office Manufacturer" TSMC. According to the latest statistics from the municipal research agency Counterpoint, TSMC, as the world's largest foundry, accounts for nearly 70% of the foundry share, including from complete system-on-chip (SoC) to independent application processors (APs) and cellular modems. The remaining 30% of the market share is basically occupied by Samsung wafer foundry.

  Editor: Elaine

  • Useless, sand and gravel are everywhere in the world, transportation costs are a little higher