4.21.3.1 Availability and Consumption

The total diatomite production in China in 1997 was over 0.3 million tons, which was equal to the actual supply.  

At present the main consumption fields of diatomite in the world are filter-aids, synthetic fillers and thermoinsulating materials. The USA, the former USSR, France, Denmark and Germany are the major diatomite consumers in the world. The USA is the largest consumer with a consumption volume of about 0.64 million tons in 1997. 

The annual diatomite consumption in China is over 0.2 million tons. The diatomite is mainly applied in thermoinsulation materials. However, the proportion of diatomite's appli-

Table 4.21.1 The major diatomite mining and processing enterprises in China

cation as the filter-aids and functional fillers has had a considerable growth in recent years. 

As for the diatomite's supply and demand in China, from a view of the availability of diatomite, the supply exceeds the demand and a part of production is exported. Judged by the varieties, neither the quality nor the number of varieties of the products can meet the increasing needs of the domestic market. Furthermore, though there are over ten filter-aids production lines with a production capacity of 5,000 t/a in China and the production exceeds the demand, the varieties are few and the quality is rather poor, and a part of products still depend on import from abroad. 

According to the Minerals Yearbook 1996 and 1997, the annual international trade volume of diatomite is between 0.45 and 0.5 million tons. The major diatomite exporting countries are the USA, Denmark, France, Spain, Canada, Mexico and so on. The major diatomite importing countries are the UK, Japan, Belgium, Germany and so on. The USA is always the largest diatomite exporting country in the world and its diatomite export volume in 1997 was 0.15 million tons. 

In recent years the China's diatomite import and export volumes have been steadily increasing. The main kinds of exported products are crude ores and low-grade products, and China imports processed products. Before 1987 China's average annual export volume was between 100 and 300 tons. In 1988 it rose suddenly to 18,051 tons. The export volume in 1997 was 0.13 million tons. China's diatomite export volume is next to that of the USA, ranking second after the USA. China's diatomite is mainly exported to Japan, Western European countries, the countries in Southeast Asia, the Republic of Korea and so on. China's export maintains a steady increase trend. 

Before 1980 China basically did not import diatomite. With an increase of the use of proportioned diatomite in filter-aids production lines introduced from abroad,  diatomite has started to be imported in batches since 1980. The average annual import volume was about 1,000 tons in a period between 1980 and 1990. It reached 4,608 tons in 1993, and in 1997 it amounts to 5,848 tons. Most diatomite imported from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea was crude ore. The USA was the most important diatomite and diatomite manufactured products supplying country for China. The import and export of diatomite and diatomite maufactured products of China during 1994~1997 are shown in Table 4.21.2.

Tab.4.21.2 China's import and export of diatomite and diatomite manufactured products during 1994~1997

4.21.3.2 Trends

Diatomite is a good filtering material and also a kind of good fillers. Judged by the current situation in China, the proportion of the diatomite used as a filler is rather small, especially the application of the diatomite in the rubber, pigment, papermaking, agricultural chemicals and panits and coatings industries is still in the development stage. But it is estimated that the development perspective is considerable. Additionally, with the rapid development of the metallurgical and building materials industries a lot of high-strength, fire-resistant and thermoinsulating materials are demanded urgently. However at present the domestic thermoinsulating materials in China are monotonous, and the quality of them is poor. They need to be imported by using a lot of foreign exchange. So the perspective of development of new high-strength, light-weighted diatomite serial thermoinsulating materials using diatomite resources is also very wide. 

In the years to come the diatomite consumption will keep a steady development, and among other things the increase of demand of the diatomite filter-aids will be faster. At the same times the use of the diatomite as the functional fillers and coatings will also have a considerable development. The increase of the diatomite used as the carrier of catalysts will be rather slow. As for thermoinsulating materials, they face a challenge of generation's substitution of a large amount of low-grade products and the development and popularization of the high-performance products. The application of the diatomite fine chemical products had already been drawing the attention and is expected to have a considerable progress. In the fields of the import and export, the import of the high-grade diatomite manufactured products will still keep the recent level. The export of the diatomite will continuously keep an increasing tendency. But the pattern of the exported commodities will have some changes with more or less increase of the proportions of manufactured products and products with high added value. It is estimated that up to 2000 the world's diatomite trade volume will amount to about 0.8 million tons, but the pattern of producing and exporting countries will not have a major change. The diatomite production in China will increase and will further participate in the world's diatomite trade. 

In the years to come, the production of common diatomite products will exceed the market demand. Nevertheless, the high-grade and fine diatomite products, such as filter-aids for liquor and wine, will still be deficient. So the development of the new products, opening-up of more markets, widening of the consumption fields and improvement of the consumption structure should be speeded up.