Instrumentation export refraction technology gap

According to customs statistics, in 2013 China's total export of instrumental products was 25.37 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 6.2% year-on-year; imports were 42.29 billion U.S. dollars, an increase of 3.8% year-on-year.

Since 2001, the import and export of instrument and instrument products in China has maintained rapid and steady growth. It was only affected by the impact of the international financial crisis in 2009. After a rapid and temporary recovery in 2010 and 2011, it has gradually become In the doldrums.

China's instrumentation products have long been in a deficit state of import and export trade. Since 2001, the trade deficit has continued to expand, and before 2006, the deficits have exceeded the export value. However, since 2005, export growth has gradually begun to exceed the increase in imports. The increase in the trade deficit has gradually narrowed, and the deficit has been exceeded by the amount of exports. The trade deficit reached its highest level of US$17.16 billion in 2011 and then began to decline.

Monthly import and export rises and falls

On the export front, after a brief period of growth at the beginning of the year, the overall performance was sluggish, and the growth rate remained stable in the second half of the year; on the import side, the monthly increase fluctuated considerably. In the year, imports and exports increased slightly, and export growth continued to be higher than the increase in imports.

Instrumentation products are mainly divided into 12 categories. In terms of exports, industrial automation systems and devices, optical instruments, and medical instruments are the most important product categories. Faster export growth includes industrial automation systems and devices (18.1%), electrical instrumentation (11.1%), and experimental analysis. Instruments (14.6%) and Weighing Instruments (10.2%). Only metering instrument exports fell year-on-year.

Industrial automatic control systems and devices, laboratory analysis instruments, medical instruments, optical instruments, and electronic measuring instruments are the main imported product categories. Faster imports include optical instruments (20.9%), laboratory analysis instruments (15.8%), and medical care. In the instrument (7.1%), the imports of other product categories have declined to varying degrees.

China's instrumentation products are only in surplus in the import and export trade of measuring instruments, weighing instruments, drawing calculations, and measuring instruments with relatively low technological content. The rest of the products are in a trade deficit, especially industrial automation systems with high technological content. The trade deficit with devices, electronic measuring instruments and medical instruments was the largest.

Asia is the major export market for instrumentation products in China, accounting for more than half, followed by Europe and North America (mainly the United States), with exports accounting for 19% of the total, and export growth in the three major markets also exceeded the average export growth. In addition, exports to Africa, Latin America and Oceania have fallen, especially to Africa.

The United States is China's largest import and export market for instrumentation products. In 2013, it exported US$6.44 billion, accounting for 18.3% of the total, which was an increase of 8.3% year-on-year. Imports from the United States accounted for US$8.8 billion, accounting for 20.8%, and a year-on-year increase of 9.2%. Among the top ten export markets, exports to Japan only decreased, and countries and regions with rapid export growth were Taiwan Province, Singapore, Germany, the Netherlands, and India, with increases of 36.2%, 15.7%, 15.5%, 11.7%, and 10.5% respectively. .

China's imports of instrumentation products from Asia accounted for 45.7%, imports from Europe accounted for 32%, imports from North America accounted for 21.5%, but the import growth from the above areas is relatively small, especially since the Asian imports only increased by 0.7%. The regions with rapid import growth are mainly in Africa, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe. The main reason is that the import base from these regions is relatively small, and fluctuations in the growth rate are more obvious.

Except for the United States, the main importing countries and regions are Japan, Germany, South Korea, and Taiwan Provinces, but only imports from Taiwan Province and South Korea have increased rapidly, with 14.9% and 12.1% respectively. Imports from Germany and Japan increased by 3.7% respectively. And dropped 8.7%.

China’s exports accounted for the largest proportion by means of general trade, reaching 44.8%, with a growth rate of 9.5%; exports through processing trade accounted for 44.4%, with a growth rate of 3.6%; processing trade was dominated by feed processing, accounting for 41%, an increase of 5.1%.

The proportion of imports by general trade was larger, at 65.5%, an increase of 6.5%; imports by processing trade accounted for 16%, down 0.1% year-on-year, of which imports of processing methods accounted for 13.9%, an increase of 1%.

Guangdong is the largest exporter of instrumentation products in China, accounting for 32.2% of exports, with a rapid increase of 14%; followed by Jiangsu (accounting for 16.9%, down 0.3%) and Shanghai (accounting for 14.1%, up 3.8%) ), Zhejiang (accounting for 9.3%, an increase of 9.3%), and Beijing (accounting for 6.3%, an increase of 6.3%). The provinces with rapid export growth are mainly Ningxia (131%), Guizhou (70.5%), Yunnan (54%), and Xinjiang (52.9%) in the west, mainly due to the large fluctuations in the export base of these regions. .

Shanghai is the province with the largest number of imported instrumentation products, with imports accounting for 21.3%, up 9.2%; followed by Guangdong (19.2%, up 4%), Beijing (16.2%, up 5.6%), and Jiangsu ( Accounting for 12.8%, down 3.1%).

In 2013, China had a total of 32,106 enterprises exporting instrumentation products. The top 100 companies accounted for 36.3% of the total exports. The top export companies were mostly foreign capital; 38,427 companies imported instrumentation products, and the top 100 companies imported 31.2% of the total. . Relatively speaking, instrument and meter import and export companies are not highly concentrated and their quotas are small and scattered.

The gap between technology and foreign countries is obvious

Instruments and meters belong to the high-tech industry. Instrumentation products are widely used in various fields of economy and society. Whether they are control devices, optical instruments, measuring instruments, or analytical instruments, the accuracy of control and the accuracy of analytical measurements are very high. At present, China's industrial development depends more on the advantages of low labor costs, capital-intensive and rapid investment, and these advantages are difficult to play a role in instrument-instrumentation technology-intensive industries.

The instrumentation industry has a wide range of products, high technical content, small production batches and difficulty in expanding, limited market capacity, and small scale of imports and exports, making it difficult to attract companies to invest in long-term and unremitting efforts. However, higher technical content also makes instrumentation products with high added value. Although it is difficult to rapidly expand output and export volume, companies are more likely to export through general trade, so the industry's profit margin is relatively high.

The gap between the level of technology and foreign countries has led to the gap between Chinese products and foreign products. Some high-end instrumentation products Chinese enterprises cannot even independently research and develop and produce. The domestic market demand can only rely on imports to meet. Due to the characteristics of the industry, it is difficult for China's instrumentation products to narrow the gap with foreign products in the short term. However, for some low-end products, Chinese enterprises have already achieved good development results through the use of technology, ingestion, and absorption, using low labor costs and large-scale production, and have a certain degree of market competitiveness. China's instrumentation and instrumentation enterprises should gradually increase their ability to introduce, digest, and absorb technology while gradually improving their own research and development capabilities, strengthen cooperation with universities and research institutes, promote the combination of innovation and scientific research results with practical applications, and improve product technology. The content and practicality gradually reduce the gap with foreign products from the production of low-end products to the testing of high-end products.