Recently, many provinces in the north are about to or have entered the state of off-peak shutdown. In the context of the intensified contradiction between supply and demand and the sharp decline in corporate profits this year, peak-staggering production has been highly expected by some people in the industry, hoping to "save" the cement industry from fire and water again with the continuous extension of peak-staggering production. Some provinces
have even added the words "self-discipline and self-help" before the name of off-peak production.
Repeatedly increasing the intensity of peak staggering production, who can be "saved"?
What is off-peak production? According to the Guiding Opinions of the General Office of the State Council on Promoting the Steady Growth of Building Materials Industry, Adjusting Structure and Increasing Benefits (No.34 issued by the State Office), peak-staggering production refers to the full implementation of peak-staggering produc tion of cement clinker (including the use of carbide slag) during the heating period in heating areas, shortening the operation time of cement clinker plant, and reducing the production of cement clinker. Reduce clinker production capacity in heating areas, effectively avoid the superposition of cement clinker production emissions and heating boiler emissions, and reduce air pollution during heating period. Cement clinker plants in other areas should also stagger peak production during the Spring Festival and hot summer days.
To sum up, peak-shifting production of cement refers to shifting the peak of coal consumption for cement production and heating during the winter warming period in northern China, and then adding the peak of electricity consumption in summer, so the peak-shifting production is the peak of coal and electricity consumption.
In other words, in addition to the peak of heating coal in winter and the measures taken to stop kilns for the purpose of making electricity available to the people, the other reasons for stopping kilns are to adjust the supply-demand relationship in a planned way in the name of peak staggering.
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How many of the current peak staggering production in the cement industry is not divorced from the original intention?
In recent years, the scope of off-peak production has been expanding since its implementation, from the northeast to the north, and then to the whole country; the time has been extending, from winter to summer, and now almost every month off-peak production. However, with the intensification of the contradiction between supply and demand in recent years, the intensity of peak staggering production is increasing, and the expected effect is getting worse and worse.
Why is it getting worse? Because the "wrong" of off-peak production is the output, not the capacity!
Over the years, the "equalitarianism" brought about by off-peak production has weakened the dominant position of superior production capacity in the market competition, but also created a living space for inefficient production capacity. From a certain point of view, when the market demand is still acceptable, off-peak production not only enables the industry to enjoy a high profit period for several years, but also protects inefficient capacity to a certain extent, which plays a negative role in effectively resolving overcapacity and misses the "window" period of resolving serious overcapacity!
More attention should be paid to the fact that in the years when the industry enjoyed the high profit period brought by peak staggering production, the new cement production capacity increased sharply, and a large number of new production lines "sprang up", which made the cement industry with excess capacity "worse".
Especially in the current situation of downward demand and increasing contradiction between supply and demand, the "tacit understanding" of cement enterprises to implement peak staggering production is no longer, the situation of "face and heart discord" occurs from time to time, the role of peak staggering production on the supply side has been very limited , and the cement industry should be more clearly aware of it. If we can not fundamentally solve the problem of serious overcapacity, "peak staggering dependence" will only make the industry "sick", which is not alarmist. The level of
equipment operation rate and the stability of equipment operation directly determine the economic benefits of enterprises. If the equipment operation rate is only below 50%, the fixed cost remains basically unchanged, and the sales revenue drops sharply, what benefits can enterprises talk about?
In addition, off-peak production will stop production for a long time and stop from time to time, which will also bring about the arrangement of workers and their income stability. Staggered production will increase the service life, safe operation, management and operation costs of the equipment, let alone understand what to install!
In fact, in order to avoid excessive impact on the income of employees during peak staggering production, many local governments and enterprises have formulated corresponding solutions, after all, enterprises and employees should take into account the dilemma!
For example, a major cement province in the north recently issued a peak-staggering production arrangement, with the number of peak-staggering production days reaching 200 days in 2023-2024. Kilns have been shut down for more than half a year. How can enterprises achieve at least break-even and guarantee the basic income of employees? It's really hard!
Back to the original question, who has been "saved" by the increasingly "wrong" off-peak production? Is it the inefficient production capacity that should be eliminated by the market but with the help of off-peak production? Or enterprise employees who stop work for half a year? Or enterprises with high debt ratio and poor competitiveness, including many large enterprises?
Ten years ago, in October 2013, the State Council issued the Guiding Opinions on Resolving the Serious Contradiction of Overcapacity (Guofa [2013] 41). The Guiding Opinions point out that under the condition of market economy, supply is moderately greater than demand, which is the premise for market competition mechanism to play its role, and is conducive to regulating supply and demand, promoting technological progress and management innovation. However, when the production capacity of products seriously exceeds the effective demand, it will cause a huge waste of social resources, reduce the efficiency of resource allocation, and hinder the upgrading of industrial structure. The first goal of
resolving the serious contradiction of excess capacity is that the scale of production capacity is basically reasonable. The total production capacity of steel, cement, electrolytic aluminum, flat glass, shipbuilding and other industries is compatible with environmental carrying capacity, market demand and resource security, and the spatial layout is coordinated with regional economic development, so that the utilization rate of production capacity reaches a reasonable level. In the final analysis, the self-rescue of the
cement industry should be carried out to resolve the serious overcapacity, so that the total capacity of the cement industry can be adapted to the environmental carrying capacity, market demand and resource security, the spatial layout can be coordinated with the regional economic development, and the capacity utilization rate can reach a reasonable level. Otherwise, what industry self-help, what industry sustained and healthy development, it is nonsense, this is rough, but the reason is not rough!
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