-An overview of China's exciting petrochemical industry-

Despite Southeast Asia's uncertain currency situation and economic crisis that commenced in July 1997 and the Russian ruble's 30% devaluation in August 1998, China's socialist market economy appears to be moving along quite well. East Asian countries, including Thailand and Indonesia, that could normally expect to find good markets within their own countries, are looking to the export of petrochemical products as a way out of their difficulties.

Meanwhile, China, despite possessing an ethylene production capacity of 3.9 million t/y (1997), cannot meet domestic demand and has been importing large quantities of the five major general purpose resins -- 5.3 million tons in 1995, 6.4 million tons in 1996, and 7.1 million tons in 1997. Will China continue to be the only country in the world importing petrochemical products in large quantities? China, under new Premier Zhu Rongji, in March 1998, began resolutely enforcing three major reformations (administrative, state enterprises and financial) of the largest scale since the founding of the People's Republic of China. How will these reforms affect China's petrochemical industry?

China, with a population of 1.2 billion and the second largest land area in the world, has, during the past eight years, racked up a high average growth rate of 10% per year, and is expected to continue to register a high growth rate in the future. Investment in China's petrochemical industry is highly active and, at the beginning of the 21st century, six new large petrochemical projects, each on the scale of 600,000 to 800,000 t/y of ethylene, will materialize through joint ventures with giant corporations of the world.

For those who, either directly or indirectly, are concerned with the petrochemical industry, the trends of China's petrochemical industry have a great influence not only on business in China but on the petrochemical business of the East Asian countries and of the whole world.

This report is a totally revised edition of our publication titled "China's Petrochemical Industry - 1995" which was very favorably received. Its main points are as follows.

1) Complete information on petrochemicals:

As in the previous report, it provides comprehensive and in-depth information on China's petrochemical industry and related topics, so that it can also be put to practical use as a wide collection of fundamental data. In particular, it not only covers the above-mentioned subjects but also gives our own independent forecasts of the demand and supply of 58 items of petrochemical products.

2) Updates and additions to previous data:

We have retained as much as possible those tables, lists, charts and other diagrams contained in the previous edition that we believe are useful, with their data updated, and have also added many more that we feel will be needed in the new era.

This edition contains about 310 pages more than the previous edition by the above 1) and 2).

Our research team spent about a year and a half in this research. Besides collecting data from various sources, four field studies were carried out in China and in Hong Kong to procure independent information. Many, many organizations and individuals, not only Chinese and Japanese, but also U.S.A. and European, cooperated in providing valuable data. We would like to extend our sincere gratitude to the Chinese, Japanese, U.S.A. and European individuals and organizations that cooperated in the publication of this report.