Illustration: Chen Xia/GT

China's rare-earth exports periodically make headlines in Western media outlets. Customs data show exports of China's rare earths increased 7.5 percent year-on-year to 34,032 tons in the first seven months of this year, with the export value narrowing by 40.7 percent. The total export value fell because of lower prices.

China is supplying the world with low-priced, high-quality rare earths and related products. But there have always been forces attempting to smear China's efforts to boost the normal development of the rare-earth industry for geopolitical and ideological reasons.

Some Western commentators have accused China of dumping "cheap" rare earths, playing up the dangers of so-called "overcapacity," or "excessive exports," and the potential impact on Western competitors. At the same time, they criticize China for tightening export controls on rare earths, claiming it may lead to "insufficient exports." These two contradictory narratives, which are both false, reflect a complex external environment for China's development of its rare-earth industries.

Some Western media outlets have criticized China for "overproducing," which they claim has led to a significant decline in rare-earth prices. But it should be noted that it is not so-called "overproducing" but China's comprehensive advantages, including advanced technology and its low-cost and low-pollution processing capacity, that enable the country's rare-earth industry to move forward even when international prices continue to fall, and to provide cost-effective products to ensure the stability of the international supply chain. China's low-cost capacity and rare-earth exports are always an asset for the global supply chain and the world's economy.

Central to Western critics is the tendency to view China's rare-earth sector through a geopolitical lens. In this context, some Western politicians are more inclined to view China as a potential threat rather than a mutually beneficial partner. This reflects a typical erroneous mind-set in politicizing economic and trade issues. Such geopolitically biased perspectives have led to a one-sided and extreme evaluation of China's rare-earth industry in the West. 

Portraying China as a "threat" through various speculative scenarios, while simultaneously taking further actions to sever global cooperation in the rare-earth industry chain, will both hinder the development of related sectors in Western countries and impede the growth of industries closely related to the rare-earth industry chain, such as new-energy products in the West.

Some Western countries are actively promoting the so-called Minerals Security Partnership, which aims to collude with a small group of nations to exclude China from industrial chain cooperation. These efforts align with and advance the geopolitical and economic interests of the US.

These measures are aimed not only at meeting their own growing demand for rare earths but also at artificially increasing the supply of rare earths in the international market. This may further disrupt the normal fluctuations in global rare-earth prices for some time. International rare-earth prices may remain low for some time to come. Western countries' practice of severing global industrial chain cooperation, which is detrimental to both others and themselves, may also put pressure on other rare-earth producing countries.

With so many challenges ahead of us, including but not limited to a drop in international prices of rare earths and the geopolitical competition provoked by certain Western countries, it is important to enhance China's technological advantages, promote the high-quality growth of the rare-earth industry, and create favorable conditions for the development of new rare-earth materials and their industrial applications.

This is exactly what happened recently in China. The State Council, the cabinet, has unveiled regulations on rare-earth management. China has key techno-economic advantages across the rare-earth value chain. Taking advantage of this situation to promote the high-quality development of new rare-earth materials and their industrial applications can ensure the healthy, stable and sustainable development of China's rare-earth industry, amid mounting challenges such as sluggish prices and an increasingly complex international landscape.

The author is a reporter with the Global Times. bizopinion@globaltimes.com.cn