中国和日本围绕所谓稀土矿供应发生的争吵，已经超越了一场外交冲突。在从电脑到电动轿车等许多高科技产品的生产中，稀土是一种不可或缺的大宗商品。
这场争端背后的动因在于，中国政府希望对这些商品实施严格的出口限制，以此鼓励外国公司将生产线搬迁到中国来。
自日本政府表示中国对日本的稀土发货已接近停止后，全球对于中国在稀土生产方面支配地位的担忧迅速加重。欧洲和美国的采购者表示，虽然速度缓慢，但他们仍在得到供应。各方都在讲着不同版本的故事——中国政府已正式否认对日禁运，并表示今年早些时候大幅削减出口配额是为了保护资源。
但中国官员和西方企业高管表示，配额削减是通过“资源换技术”来促进国内制造业发展的策略的一部分。
配额会强烈刺激外国公司将生产转移到在中国的合资企业，因为配额只适用于未经过加工的稀土，而不适用于稀土加工产品，例如用稀土制造的磁铁。
高管们表示，比配额更重要的是中国各种各样的税收减免：25%的出口关税和17%的增值税退税意味着，中国国内的稀土价格比国外低很多，从而诱使各公司搬迁到中国。
咨询公司欧亚集团(Eurasia Group)的马达明(Damien Ma)表示，中国工业和信息化部已通过了一项“部分通过控制出口量”来重组稀土行业的政策。
根据这项计划，到2015年之前，中国应将稀土的年出口量维持在3.5万吨左右——今年的配额约为3万吨。中国将每年生产13万至15万吨稀土，并拥有12万至15万吨的国内加工能力。
马达明表示：“中国打算通过将供应链的关键环节留在国内，整合生产，创造出附加值更高的含稀土应用材料，而不是出口完全未经加工的稀土。”
一些日本官员和业内高管认为，该策略对日本政府在稀土应用领域的技术领导地位构成了严重威胁。一名日本官员表示：“显然，中国想要核心技术。那是一种新的重商主义。”
中国的政策开始让一些日本生产商感到担忧。
TDK就感受到了转移生产和技术的压力。该公司是全球最大的磁力电动机生产商之一，其产品用于电脑硬盘驱动器、混合动力汽车和工业机器人等领域。TDK的技术严格保密，加工的后期阶段仅在日本工厂进行。
业内高管和分析师们表示，由于日本国内不开采稀土，日本将别无选择，只能答应中国政府的一些要求，至少把部分生产厂搬到中国去。
但一些西方国家的高管却颇为乐观，对日本的担忧不以为然。法国的Rhodia Group和加拿大的Neo Material Technologies都是市场领军企业，两者都在本世纪头十年在中国开设了工厂。磁铁制造商Daido Electronics等日本公司也已在中国建厂。
Neo Material Technologies首席执行官康斯坦丁•卡拉扬诺普洛斯(Constantine Karayannopoulos)估计，超过半数的中国稀土需求“实际上是由在中国设厂的日本公司及韩国、欧洲和美国公司（后者程度稍轻一些）消化的”。全球约有95%的稀土产出来自中国，但中国也占了全球需求的65%左右——尽管这些需求之后几乎都被制造商再出口到国外。日本消耗约20%的全球产出，其余部分基本上由欧洲和美国均摊。
卡拉扬诺普洛斯表示：“情况并没有表面上看上去那么糟糕，因为含有稀土的材料、部件和最终产品的出口没有出口配额。”
Rhodia表示，在稀土发货方面，该公司“还没有遭遇任何问题”。
此外，业内高管们表示，长期来看，中国利用配额发展国内产业的策略可能会产生反作用，因为这将促使其他国家发展替代矿产，或者更有可能的情况是，发展不那么依赖于稀土的工业流程。
译者/李裕
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001035178
The spat between China and Japan about supplies of so-called rare earth minerals – vital commodities used in high-tech goods from computers to electric cars – is more than just a diplomatic clash.
Driving the dispute is Beijing’s ambition to use tough export limits on these commodities as leverage to encourage foreign companies to relocate production lines to China.
Global concerns about China’s dominance of rare earth production have grown rapidly following, what Tokyo says, has been a near halt to shipments to Japan. Purchasers in Europe and the US say they are still getting shipments, albeit slowly. Each side tells a different version of the story: Beijing has officially denied the embargo to Japan and says heavy export quota cuts, imposed earlier this year, mark an effort to conserve resources.
But Chinese officials and western executives say quota cuts are part of a strategy intended to boost development of its domestic manufacturing industry by trading “resources for technology”.
The quotas create a powerful incentive to foreign companies to transfer production to China-based joint ventures because they only apply to the raw rare earths, not processed forms of the commodity, such as rare earth-made magnets.
Executives say that even more important than the quotas are a myriad Chinese tax breaks: an export duty of 25 per cent and a 17 per cent VAT rebate means that rare earth prices are much lower in China than overseas, enticing companies to relocate to China.
China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has championed a policy to restructure the rare earths sector, “partly by controlling export volumes”, says Damien Ma of consultants Eurasia Group.
According to this plan, by 2015, China should maintain an annual export level of around 35,000 tonnes of rare earth metals – compared with this year’s quota of about 30,000 tonnes. It will be producing 130,000-150,000 tonnes, and have a domestic processing capacity of 120,000-150,000 tonnes.
“Instead of exporting purely unprocessed rare earths, the intention is to consolidate production and create more value-added applied materials that contain rare earths by keeping a crucial link of the supply chain in-country,” says Mr Ma.
The strategy is seen by some Japanese officials and executives as posing a serious threat to Tokyo’s technology leadership in the use of rare earths. “Clearly China wants the core technologies,” says one Japanese official. “It’s a new kind of mercantilism.”
China’s policy is causing concern at some Japanese producers.
TDK, one of the world’s largest producers of magnetic motors used in computer hard disk drives, hybrid cars and industrial robots, sees pressure to transfer production and technology. TDK’s techniques are a closely guarded secret, and advanced stages of the process are carried out only at its facilities in Japan.
Executives and analysts say Japan, which does not mine rare earths domestically, would have no other option but to accommodate some of Beijing’s demands and relocate at least some production plants to China.
But executives from some western countries are sanguine and downplay Tokyo’s concerns. Rhodia Group of France and Neo Material Technologies of Canada, both market leaders, opened factories in China in the last decade. Japanese companies such as Daido Electronics, a magnets producer, have also built plants in China.
Constantine Karayannopoulos, chief executive of Neo Material Technologies, estimates that more than half of Chinese rare earth demand is “actually consumed by Japanese, and to a lesser extent, South Korean, European and American companies, with plants inside the country”. China produces about 95 per cent of the world’s rare earth output, but it also accounts for around 65 per cent of global demand– although almost all of it is later re-exported by manufacturers. Japan consumes around 20 per cent of the world’s output, with the rest roughly split between Europe and the US.
“The picture is not as bad as it seems on the surface because materials, components and finished products containing rare earths can be exported without export quotas,” says Mr Karayannopoulos.
Rhodia says it “has not experienced any issue” with rare earth shipments.
Moreover, over the long-term, China’s strategy of using quotas to develop its domestic industry could backfire by facilitating the development of alternative mines in other countries or, more likely, industrial processes less reliant on rare earths, executives say.
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