Asbestos consumption in the world is declining, especially in Western europe. In 1975, the world's asbestos output reached 5 million 90 thousand tons, to 1999 only 1 million 930 thousand tons, in 2002 has picked up, only 2 million 130 thousand tons. Asbestos products have been partially or totally banned in Western European countries. In other parts of the world, the demand for cheap and durable asbestos products is strong, especially for asbestos cement (A/C) products, such as asbestos cement sheets for construction and asbestos cement pipes for water transmission.Asbestos consumption in the United States has been decreasing year by year, with asbestos mainly from Canada, and asbestos consumption in the United States dropped to 6000 tons in 2003. Consumer areas are mainly commercial buildings, roofing materials, coating composite materials, friction materials, gasket materials, insulation materials.
The price of the international market by the British asbestos had been published in Journal of industrial minerals monthly, May 2001 British industrial mineral price published and the United Kingdom in March 2004 MineralPriceWatch published in Canada chrysotile asbestos can be seen compared to the price, prices remain stable.Because the western countries had a tendency to decrease the use of asbestos and asbestos, environmental protection and other issues, asbestos ore market in a certain time in the future, the number of transactions will be subject to certain restrictions, the price will be based on MineralPriceWatch, the small fluctuations, but the asbestos products prices will remain very strong.Chinese imported asbestos mainly from Russia, and is mainly ordinary asbestos, the price level has been maintained at around $171 per ton in 2004, the international market price of asbestos has not changed, but the Russian Chinese asbestos imports mainly by virtue of its status, the price per ton up to $5, $176.Classification of asbestos sales: according to the British industrial minerals, is referring to the Canadian standards, pricing respectively from chrysotile third groups to seventh groups, South Africa is five or six, seven groups of chrysotile, crocidolite in South Africa in the long and short fiber delivery.
The consumption of asbestos in China is the largest of the consumption of cement products, accounting for about 70% to 80% of the total consumption, followed by 8% to 12% of friction materials, about 6% to 8% of sealing materials, and about 9% of textile products and other uses.China's exports of asbestos are low, with exports of 3472 tons in 2003, mainly exported to North Korea (1234 tons), Thailand (1539 tons), Malaysia (513 tons), Japan (48 tons), amounting to $1 million 556 thousand and 200.China used to import some of the long fiber asbestos, in order to make up for the shortage of domestic long fiber asbestos. After 1991, the influx of Russian asbestos, imports rose sharply, only in 2003, in addition to import 1366 tons of asbestos fiber, the amount of $about 960000 over the same period, generally also imported 142111 tons of asbestos, amounting to $24 million 310 thousand.
