China buys plastic scrap from the U.S., recycles it, makes finished goods and ships the finished products right back to the United States. We've all heard this story, right?

"It's not the case," said Patty Moore, president of Moore Recycling Associates Inc. in Sonoma, Calif.

Speaking at a Jan. 27 online seminar hosted by the Association of Postconsumer Plastic Recyclers, Moore said most of the plastic waste that China imports and recycles ends up in goods sold in China.

The reasons are most quality-related, such as color consistency. Imported scrap is a good source of lower-cost feedstock to serve China's domestic population.

But even China is raising their bar on the quality of scrap, because workers there now demand better working conditions for hand-sorting jobs in the recycling industry, Moore said. During her tours of recycling firms in China, she saw things that are not "up to spec" and that would make OSHA "appalled."

"Low-quality bales will not be wanted in China," she said. "U.S. needs to deal with our own waste...Don't take garbage to have someone else deal with it."

Millions of Chinese migrant workers have returned home, enjoying their family reunions during the Spring Festival this week. But many workers are staying in their host cities for various reasons.

A Feb. 2 Xinhua feature story interviewed a half dozen of workers in Hangzhou, capital city of Zhejiang province.

At a privately owned injection molding factory, workers said the production schedule is so tight that the company only gave them three days off. Most migrant workers rely on lower-cost travel such as the train and bus, and it can take days to return to their hometowns across the vast country.

It's also extremely difficult to get train tickets around this time, and rampant ticket scalping makes the limited number of available tickets less affordable.

For some migrant workers, long distance travel can eat up a big chunk of their savings during the past year. They choose to stay in the factory and wire money home instead.

Migrant workers, especially in the service industry, also find inflated pay rates during the holiday season worthwhile, as city residents and middle class consumers willingly spend more for highly sought after service providers to maintain their usual lifestyle.

China's PVC resin capacity reached 20.4 million tons per annum at the end of 2010.

Actual output hit 11.3 million tons in 2010, 11.3 percent up from a year ago. PVC imports declined 22.7 percent, and PVC exports dipped 3.4 percent.

(Source: China's National Development and Reform Commission)

China's polyethylene production reached 9.86 million tons in 2010, 28.6 percent higher than 2009.
Polypropylene output recorded 9.17 million tons, 13.5 percent up from a year ago.

Imports of PE and PP fell 0.7 percent and 7.1 percent respectively. Exports of PE and PP grew, but the total quantities remain small.

Ethylene output jumped 31.7 percent to 14.19 million tons.

(Source: China's National Development and Reform Commission)

Manufacturers in China are experiencing the annual post-Spring-Festival shortage of workers. In addition to higher pay and better benefits, some employers are going out of their way to recruit and retain talent.

Plastic molders in Chongqing city, one of China's booming auto, motorcycle and IT manufacturing centers, forecast a shortage of more than10, 000 workers this year, according to the Chongqing Morning Post.

In order to attract new workers and retain current workforce in a seller's market, companies post ads, offer generous referral bonuses, raise wages and bonuses, and improve medical and retirement benefits.

Some hiring managers take a step further by offering management training, career planning, and, less conventionally, even dating services.

PP and PE prices saw a 15 percent increase last year in China and the trend continues to be going upward, according to financial daily China Business News.

Ethylene price has jumped from $800 per ton last year to $1,300 per ton, CBN quoted an analyst saying. Spot prices rose 100 to 300 yuan per ton during the past week.

The China Petroleum and Chemical Industry Associated estimated that ethylene consumption will grow 13 percent in 2011.

Agricultural film maker Xinjiang Tianye Col. Ltd. said it decided to switch to toll manufacturing during the financial crisis in order to minimize the impact of resin price fluctuation. The Shanghai-listed company plans to continue to employ the model.

North America's largest PVC pipe extruder JM Eagle has pretty much stayed out of the world's largest market for its products -- China, despite the company's Taiwanese roots. But that is going to change.

The company is sending a clear signal, as its President Walter Wong met yesterday with commercial development officials in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan province in Southwest China.

"We hope to bring the best products and technologies that we've developed in the U.S. during the past 20-plues years to the mainland," Wong was cited as saying by a Feb. 17 Chengdu Daily report.

He added an even more aggressive comment, saying that JM Eagle's presence in mainland China, albeit nonexistent presently, will become twice the size of its American operation by the end of the decade, if not sooner.

"[Mainland] China is full of opportunities, we hope to invest here, and Chengdu is a location worth considering," Wong said.

Wong, a U.C. Berkley graduate, said his first job was as a production operator at a circuit board factory under his father Wang Yung Ching's conglomerate Formosa Plastics Group (FPG).

Wong joined JM Manufacturing in 1990, and he boosted the company's sales from US$200 million to more than US$1 billion in 2005, according to the Chengdu Evening News.

He made JM Manufacturing an independent entity from FPG in November 2005, and then formed JM Eagle by merging with PW Eagle Inc. in 2007.

Hong Kong Kingboard Investment Ltd. announced plans to build a series of chemical plants in Huai'an, Jiangsu province, including a 30,000 ton-per-annum PVC facility, despite the low utilization rate of existing PVC plants in China.

The total investment could reach US$1 billion, according to latest reports from local newspapers. The initial capacity, which is not revealed, is expected to come on stream by the end of 2012.

Overcapacity has kept the national average rate of PVC capacity utilization at low levels for years. The majority of PVC output in China is produced from acetylene derived from calcium carbide, while the ethylene route dominates the rest of the world.

Kingboard said its investment will leverage the inorganic salts chemical industry in Huai'an.

China's PVC resin capacity topped 20 million tons per annum at the end of 2010, while actual output reached just 11.3 million tons.