Import of coal increased by 33% from January to February

The international market is an important component of China's energy strategy of "four revolutions and one cooperation". China's coal supply is mainly domestic coal, supplemented by imported coal. Reasonable import of coal and effective utilization of international resources are conducive to all-round international cooperation and energy security under open conditions. From January to February 2020, under the influence of the epidemic, the import of domestic coal increased dramatically to 68.06 million tons, an increase of 33.1% year on year. The reason is how did the surge of imported coal at the beginning of the year? Will this trend continue? Under the epidemic situation, the imported coal will be 68.06 million tons from January to February 2020, up 33.1% year on year, according to the data released by the General Administration of Customs on March 7, 2020.

The main reasons for the large increase are as follows: first, data distortion caused by centralized Customs clearance at the beginning of 2020. In the fourth quarter of 2019, China's import policy was tightened as a whole. In order to stabilize the import quota in 2019, the customs did not clear the coal arriving at the port at the end of 2019. In December 2019, the number of imported coal plummeted to 2.77 million tons, a year-on-year decrease of 7.46 million tons, down 73%; a month on month decrease of 18 million tons, down 87%. From January to February in 2020, the centralized Customs clearance of coal arriving at the port at the end of 2019 will result in the time difference between the import data and the actual arrival. According to the monitoring of maritime satellite system, from December 2019 to February 2020, the actual arrival of imported coal in China is about 23 million tons per month, and the actual arrival in January February is about 48 million tons. Second, the demand for imported coal rose in February. The novel coronavirus pneumonia outbreak occurred after the Spring Festival in 2020.

The domestic coal market was in a tight supply stage. The main production areas in Shanxi, Shaanxi and Mongolia were slow to resume production and slow production, and the coal supply and demand were temporarily out of balance. The coal price rose by about 20 CNY/ton in February, and the demand for imported coal increased correspondingly, and the import coal price rose. In February, the amount of coal arriving at the port was about 23 million tons, up 30% compared with the imported coal of 17.64 million tons in February 2019. Third, importers should seize the quota and purchase imported coal over schedule. In 2019, domestic power plants and traders actively carried out import coal business, and the number of imported coal continued to increase. In 2020, all importers and terminal power plants seized the quota, and used the import quota in advance in January and February, and the import progress exceeded the standard. Taking Guangdong Province as an example, in January 2020, 7.2 million tons of imported coal will be unloaded, accounting for 28% of the total control target for half a year.

It is expected that the imported coal in Guangdong Province will reach the control target for half a year in the first quarter. In recent years, the data of domestic coal import has been increasing year by year. According to the data published by the National Bureau of statistics, China's coal import increased steadily from 204.15 million tons in 2015 to 299.67 million tons in 2019, an increase of 46%. In 2019, China's raw coal output reached 3.97 billion tons, a year-on-year increase of 4.0%, while the import coal increased by 6.3% year-on-year, and the growth rate of import coal was higher than that of domestic coal output. In 2019, China's coal import mainly comes from Indonesia, Australia, Mongolia, Russia and the Philippines, accounting for 46%, 26%, 12%, 11% and 3% respectively. After the surge of imported coal, facing the explosive customs clearance of imported coal from January to February, China Customs issued relevant measures in March to control the imported coal.