Through the Looking Glass: Subsidies to China’s Glass Industry

Abstract

This chapter documents the Chinese glass industry’s growth and subsidies from 2004-2008. In 2009, with 31 percent of global production, China was the world’s largest producer of glass and glass products, had the greatest number of glass-producing enterprises, and the largest number of float-glass production lines. China was also the largest glass consumer. Since 2003, Chinese glass production had doubled; production capacity had also doubled since 2003 and increased threefold since 2000. China’s glass industry enjoyed no economies of scale or scope and displayed geographic fragmentation, with manufacturers in 29 of the 32 provinces. Analysis took place at the flat-glass sector that received $4.8 billion in subsidies from 2004-2008. Extrapolating to the glass industry, China’s glass and glass-products industry received at least $30.3 billion in subsidies from 2004-2008, including to heavy oil, coal, electricity, and soda ash, reaching 35 percent of gross industrial output value of glass in 2008.