According to the world bank that the world stone industry will have a faster development in 2013, it is expected that the output of stone material will reach 80.86 million tons, the output of 12 main producer will reach 73 million tons, which will continue to dominate 90% of the material in the world.
In 2013, the main slab consumer that the consumption is more than 10 million square meters is expected to be 15: China will be 77.46 million square meters; the United States would be 45.8 million square meters; Japan will be 36.41 million square meters; Spain will be 31.49 million square meters; India will be 31.14 million square meters; Italy will be 17.38 million square meters. The consumption of the 15 main stone consumers will occupy more than 80% of the world total consumption, the traditional consumption pattern won’t occur a big change.
It is estimated that the exports volume of the six main stone export country in 2013 will be above 1 million tons: China will be 11.3 million tons; Italy will be 4.56 million tons; Spain will be 3.65 million tons; India will be 2.8 million tons; Portugal will be 1.32 million tons; Brazil will be 1.22 million tons. The total amount of stone export for the six countries will be about 24.85 million tons, which accounts about 89% of the world trade volume, the traditional trade pattern will not occur big changes as well. The main reason that the above six countries which has a large stone export is that these countries have the rare and precious stone varieties of the world.
China has a vast land and contain rich precious stone mineral deposits, the coastal, inland, and western region all own the precious stone mine, Beijing, Fujian, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, Guangxi, Yunnan, etc. are the main producing area of precious stone, which provide the most basic guarantee for the development of stone industry, as well as expand the stone export.
The advantage of China stone export: the scarce varieties are many, which have a wide distribution, therefore cost is low, and the quality is good. But due to the specification of export product is small, which can’t reach the requirement of foreign merchant, the price therefore is relatively low in the international market. In addition, the color and design of the export products also can't keep up with the world trend. What’s more, the influence of the transportation, climate, mining conditions (water, electricity, machinery, talent, technology) in the remote mountain, which limits the quantity of production and export.
