National Development and Reform Commission
Ministry of Ecology and Environment
Guiding Opinions on Promoting the High-Quality Development of the Casting and Forging Industry
Document No.: MIIT-LTZ [2023] 40
To the competent departments of industry and information technology, development and reform commissions, and departments/bureaus of ecology and environment of all provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities directly under the Central Government, cities separately listed in the state plan, and the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps:
Casting and forging are indispensable processes in the equipment manufacturing industry. They serve as crucial support and fundamental assurance for the innovative development of numerous host products and high-end equipment, and are vital to the security and stability of the equipment manufacturing industry’s industrial and supply chains. In order to better promote the high-quality development of the casting and forging industry and continuously enhance its supportive and safeguarding role for the equipment manufacturing industry, the following opinions are hereby issued.
I. Overall Requirements
(I) Guiding Principles
Guided by Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, and fully implementing the spirit of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China and the First and Second Plenary Sessions of the 20th Central Committee, we will adhere to the better integration of an effective market and a proactive government, focusing on promoting the high-quality development of the casting and forging industries, and ensuring the safety and stability of the equipment manufacturing industry’s supply chain. We will strive to improve the independent innovation capabilities of the casting and forging industries, guide their standardized development, promote the green and intelligent transformation of production methods, enhance industry quality and efficiency, and comprehensively strengthen the competitiveness of the industrial chain, providing solid support for accelerating new industrialization and building a manufacturing powerhouse.
(II) Basic Principles
Adhere to innovation-driven development. Place technological innovation at the core, strengthen the leading role of enterprises in innovation, promote deep integration of industry, academia, and research led by enterprises, break through a number of key core technologies, accelerate high-end and intelligent transformation, and improve the level of independent innovation.
Adhere to market orientation. Give full play to the decisive role of the market in resource allocation, and respect the market entity status and independent decision-making power of enterprises. Better leverage the role of the government to build a fair and orderly market competition order and create a favorable development environment.
Adhere to green development. Establish a systemic thinking approach, focusing on both development and reform, and collaboratively promote carbon reduction, pollution control, greening, and growth. Implement energy saving and emission reduction, water saving and pollution reduction, and material saving and consumption reduction upgrades, integrating green concepts throughout the entire casting and forging production process.
Adhere to quality first. Give play to the leading role of standards, strengthen the primary responsibility of enterprises for quality, improve quality control capabilities throughout the entire production process, improve product quality, achieve improved quality and efficiency in the industry, and ensure the safety and stability of the industrial chain and supply chain.
(III) Development Goals
By 2025, the overall level of the casting and forging industries will be further improved, and the ability to ensure the safety and stability of the equipment manufacturing industry’s supply chain will be significantly enhanced. The industrial structure will be more rational, and the industrial layout and production factors will be more coordinated. Breakthroughs will be achieved in high-end castings and forgings in key areas, and a number of core technologies with independent intellectual property rights will be mastered. Advanced process technologies such as integrated die casting, moldless casting, sand mold 3D printing, ultra-high-strength steel hot forming, precision cold, warm, and hot forging, and lightweight high-strength alloys will be industrialized. More than 10 industrial clusters with demonstrative effects will be built, and a sound ecosystem of coordinated development among large, medium, and small enterprises and upstream and downstream of the industrial chain will be initially formed. The effects of intelligent transformation will be prominent, and more than 30 intelligent manufacturing demonstration factories will be built. Cultivate more than 100 green factories, reduce particulate matter emissions in the foundry industry by more than 30% compared to 2020, achieve an annual recycling and reuse rate of over 8 million tons of foundry waste sand, and reduce energy consumption per ton of forgings by 5% compared to 2020.
By 2035, the overall industry level will enter the ranks of international advanced levels, forming a complete industrial technology system and continuous innovation capabilities, significantly strengthening the resilience of the industrial chain and supply chain, and substantially improving the level of green development. A number of world-class high-quality enterprise groups will be cultivated, and internationally competitive advanced manufacturing clusters will be formed.
II. Key Tasks
(I) Improving Industry Innovation Capabilities
1. Carrying out key core technology research. Promote the construction of a technology innovation system with enterprises as the main body and integrating industry, academia, research, and application. Encourage enterprises to conduct collaborative research with upstream main equipment manufacturers, universities, and research institutes, promoting collaborative innovation across the upstream, midstream, and downstream of the industrial chain, integrated innovation between large, medium, and small enterprises, and the transformation and application of scientific and technological achievements. Focusing on national strategies and industrial development needs, through the implementation of industrial foundation rebuilding projects, support key core technology research, break through urgently needed advanced basic processes and equipment, key basic materials, and key software in the industry, fill the gaps in the industrial chain, and strive to improve the resilience of the equipment manufacturing industrial chain and supply chain, and enhance the anti-shock capability of the industrial system.
2. Developing advanced casting processes and equipment. Focus on developing advanced casting processes and equipment such as high-density clay sand automated molding, high-efficiency self-hardening sand casting, precision core assembly molding, shell molding, centrifugal casting, metal mold casting, iron mold sand coating, lost foam/V-process/solid mold casting, light alloy high-pressure/extrusion/differential pressure/low-pressure/semi-solid/pressure-regulated casting, silica sol investment casting, short-process casting, and sand mold 3D printing.
3. Developing advanced forging and pressing processes and equipment. The focus will be on developing advanced forging and pressing processes and equipment, including high-speed stamping of precision structural parts, deep drawing of ultra-high-strength sheet metal, impact hydraulic forming of high-strength lightweight alloy sheets, spinning of complex and irregularly shaped structures, high-speed precision multi-station forging, cold and hot radial forging, stamping and forging composite near-net-shape forming, short-process die forging and free forging, precision forging, powder precision forging, digital sheet metal manufacturing and forming centers, and digital high-efficiency general parts processing centers.
4. Strengthening the construction of innovation service platforms. Optimize and improve the construction level of existing R&D and innovation institutions, build a number of public service platforms for industrial technology foundations, and promote the integrated development of technical basic elements such as standards, metrology, certification and accreditation, inspection and testing, experimental verification, industrial information, intellectual property rights, and achievement transformation, enhancing the capacity for providing common technical services to the industry. Establish databases for materials and processes, and carry out process data analysis and optimization services. Encourage qualified enterprises and research institutes to integrate innovation resources and establish basic research institutions to improve the supply capacity of common technologies.
(II) Promoting the standardized development of the industry
1. Promoting the optimization of industrial structure. Strictly implement relevant laws, regulations, and standards on energy conservation, environmental protection, quality, and safety technologies, as well as policies such as the “Guidance Catalogue for Industrial Structure Adjustment,” and eliminate outdated production capacity with backward processes and equipment, substandard pollutant emissions, and inadequate production safety in accordance with the law and regulations. Encourage key areas for air pollution control to intensify efforts to eliminate outdated capacity. Foundry enterprises shall not use outdated processes and equipment such as coreless power frequency induction furnaces, non-magnetic yoke (≥0.25 tons) aluminum shell medium frequency induction furnaces, ammonium chloride hardened shell investment casting with water glass, and aluminum alloy hexachloroethane refining. Accelerate the upgrading and transformation of existing projects, and promote enterprises to reasonably select advanced processes and technologies that are low-pollution, low-energy consumption, and economically efficient, improving the industry’s competitiveness. Strengthen the coordinated layout of casting and forging with the equipment manufacturing industry, guide qualified enterprises to gather in industrial parks for concentrated development, improve the collaborative supporting capabilities of the industrial chain and supply chain, and build an industrial pattern with a reasonable layout, complementary advantages, supply-demand linkage, and coordinated development.
2. Supporting the construction of high-end projects. Promote the implementation of the national unified market construction and remove key bottlenecks restricting the development of the industry. Guide all regions to plan and implement new or upgraded high-end construction projects based on their actual conditions, and support enterprises in providing supporting production for main engine manufacturers or major projects, ensuring the safety and stability of the equipment manufacturing industry’s industrial chain and supply chain. Strictly review new construction and expansion projects to ensure that project filing, environmental impact assessment, pollution discharge permits, safety assessments, and energy conservation reviews are clear and complete, and that project construction complies with relevant national laws, regulations, and standards. Strictly implement total control of major pollutant emissions and total energy consumption and intensity control systems, resolutely curb the blind development of non-compliant projects and low-level repetitive construction, prevent blind expansion of production capacity, and effectively promote the optimization and upgrading of the industrial structure.
3. Standardize industry supervision and management. Systematically, scientifically, and orderly promote industry transformation and upgrading, avoiding “one-size-fits-all” policy implementation and “layering of requirements.” Fully leverage the role of industry self-governance and strengthen industry self-discipline. Promote the revision of the “Normative Conditions for Foundry Enterprises” (T/CFA 0310021), and encourage local governments to use these conditions to guide the standardized development of foundry enterprises. Strictly distinguish the production process characteristics of the forging and pressing industry and the steel industry, avoiding the misclassification of steelmaking supporting forging and pressing as steel smelting production, and strictly prohibiting the illegal addition of steel production capacity, illegal production of steel billets and ingots, and their sale under the guise of casting and forging.
(III) Accelerate Green Development of the Industry
1. Accelerate the green and low-carbon transformation. Promote green practices throughout the entire casting and forging production process, develop green raw and auxiliary materials, promote green processes, build green factories, develop green industrial parks, and deeply promote the circular transformation of industrial parks. Promote enterprises to disclose environmental information in accordance with the law and accept social supervision. Actively carry out clean production, do a good job in energy conservation supervision and enforcement, and energy conservation diagnostic services, and deeply explore energy conservation potential. Encourage enterprises to adopt high-efficiency and energy-saving melting and heat treatment equipment, and improve the level of waste heat utilization. Promote short-process casting, and encourage the conversion of cupola furnaces (10 tons/hour and below) in the casting industry to electric furnaces. Promote the application of casting waste sand regeneration technology, and the recycling and utilization of waste metals. Promote integrated, large-scale, short-process, low-cost forging and pressing technology, promote the application of environmentally friendly lubricating media, and increase the proportion of non-heat-treated steel used, etc.
2. Improve environmental protection management level. Apply for pollution discharge permits in accordance with the law, strictly discharge pollutants with permits, and comply with the requirements of self-monitoring, record-keeping, execution reports, and information disclosure as stipulated in the pollution discharge permits. Taking into account production processes, raw and auxiliary material usage, fugitive emission control, and the operational effectiveness of pollution control facilities, a number of environmentally exemplary enterprises reaching Level A performance in responding to heavy pollution weather will be established to drive improvements in the industry’s environmental performance. Foundry enterprises shall strictly implement the “Emission Standard of Air Pollutants for the Foundry Industry” (GB 39726) and local emission standards, strengthen fugitive emission control, and those that cannot consistently meet emission standards shall complete facility upgrades and renovations within a specified period. Enterprises that do not have the conditions for renovation or still cannot meet standards after renovation will be eliminated in accordance with laws and regulations. Foundry pig iron enterprises are encouraged to carry out ultra-low emission transformations for organized emissions, fugitive emissions, and clean transportation, referencing the requirements for ultra-low emission transformation in the steel industry. Industry associations are encouraged to publicize the progress.
(IV) Promoting Intelligent Transformation of the Industry
Accelerate the deep integration of next-generation information technology with the entire process and all elements of casting and forging production. Support enterprises in using digital technology to transform traditional process equipment and production lines. Guide key enterprises to carry out services such as remote monitoring, fault diagnosis, predictive maintenance, and product quality control. Strengthen the application of numerical simulation technology in process optimization, and promote process innovation, equipment upgrading, management optimization, and intelligent production processes in industry enterprises. Encourage leading equipment manufacturing enterprises to open up application scenarios, increase the application innovation of domestic industrial software, build digital collaborative platforms, and drive upstream and downstream enterprises to simultaneously implement intelligent manufacturing. Guide small and medium-sized enterprises to utilize cloud platforms, and promote supply chain collaborative manufacturing and the innovative application of new technologies and models. Vigorously carry out intelligent manufacturing demonstration and promotion, identify and select a number of typical intelligent manufacturing scenarios in the casting and forging fields, build a number of intelligent manufacturing demonstration factories, and cultivate a number of high-quality system solution providers. Strengthen the construction of intelligent manufacturing standard systems in the casting and forging industries, and encourage enterprises to conduct intelligent manufacturing capability maturity assessments.
(V) Supporting the Development of High-Quality Enterprises
1. Cultivating High-Quality Enterprises. Focusing on key equipment manufacturing enterprises, cultivate and build a number of core enterprises in the industrial chain and supply chain, promoting enterprises to deeply cultivate segmented fields, strengthen specialized and differentiated development, and drive the formation of a number of specialized, refined, and innovative “little giant” enterprises and manufacturing single-product champions in the casting and forging industries. Support key industry enterprises to enhance their endogenous development momentum, and cultivate a number of leading manufacturing enterprises with core competitiveness in the fields of automobiles, internal combustion engines, and energy and power equipment. 1. Give full play to the pivotal role of high-quality enterprises in ensuring the security and stability of industrial and supply chains, organize participation in actions to strengthen and complement the equipment manufacturing industry chain, strengthen advantageous areas, address weaknesses, and enhance the stability and competitiveness of industrial and supply chains. Leverage the role of national industry-finance cooperation platforms to guide financial institutions to provide targeted support to enterprises in the casting and forging industries.
2. Build distinctive industrial clusters. Encourage local governments to cultivate distinctive casting and forging industrial clusters around the layout of the equipment manufacturing industry, improve supporting policies, and promote the standardized, large-scale, green, and intensive development of clusters. Encourage all regions to identify industrial development positioning, determine development scale and structure, and formulate comprehensive remediation plans based on the characteristics of local industrial clusters, promoting cluster upgrading and transformation in terms of production processes, product quality, safety production, and pollution prevention and control (source reduction, process control, and end-of-pipe treatment). Guide differentiated development among clusters, leverage the driving role of leading enterprises in the industry, and promote deep interconnection and collaborative response with the equipment manufacturing industry chain and supply chain. Improve the construction of public service systems for industrial clusters, including R&D and design, inspection and testing, experimental verification, 3D printing services, heat treatment, electroplating, spraying, warehousing and logistics, solid waste treatment, talent training, and financing.
(VI) Improving Industry Quality and Efficiency
1. Strengthen standard leadership. Focus on building and improving a new casting and forging standard system, and promote the coordinated development of national standards, industry standards, local standards, and group standards. Based on the characteristics and requirements of industry development, benchmark against advanced international energy efficiency levels, and promptly carry out standard revision, promotion, and application work. Establish and improve standards and norms for industry energy consumption, material consumption, pollution prevention and control, comprehensive resource utilization, and clean production, guiding enterprises towards clean, efficient, low-carbon, and circular development. Deeply participate in the formulation of international standards and promote the accelerated transformation of standards in advantageous fields into international standards.
2. Improve product quality. Strengthen the construction of enterprise quality assurance systems, and promote the application of standards, certification, metrology, testing and inspection, and quality control technologies in enterprise quality control and quality management. Guide enterprises to carry out quality traceability, risk analysis, and quality improvement to improve quality management levels. Further strengthen intellectual property protection, and guide enterprises to establish a quality-based brand development strategy to enhance brand image and influence. Encourage industry associations and professional institutions to establish quality control and evaluation standards for the entire casting and forging production process, focusing on improving product quality stability, consistency, and reliability. (VII) Deepening International Exchange and Cooperation
Support industry enterprises, academic institutions, and industry organizations in conducting international exchanges and cooperation in technology, standards, testing and certification, intellectual property, and talent training. Promote international cooperation in production capacity and equipment manufacturing, and expand new spaces for industrial development. Encourage strengthening cooperation with foreign companies in high-end equipment manufacturing and parts manufacturing, and promote qualified enterprises to actively integrate into the global industrial chain and supply chain. Attract foreign companies in relevant fields to establish R&D institutions in China and jointly carry out advanced technology research and development and achievement transformation.
III. Guarantee Measures
(I) Strengthening Organization and Implementation. Relevant departments in all regions should strengthen overall coordination, reinforce responsibility division, and effectively address major issues affecting the high-quality development of the casting and forging industries, ensuring the safety and stability of the equipment manufacturing industry chain and supply chain. Implement and refine a package of policies to stabilize the industrial economy and promote the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry, supporting casting and forging SMEs in overcoming difficulties and achieving high-quality development. Relevant enterprises should pragmatically advance relevant work in accordance with the key tasks. Industry organizations should strengthen guidance and services, promptly collect and report new situations and problems, and put forward policy recommendations.
(II) Creating a Favorable Environment. Focus on demand guidance and standard leadership to promote the standardized and healthy development of enterprises. Enhance enterprises’ sense of social responsibility and industry self-discipline, conscientiously fulfill environmental protection and safety responsibilities, avoid disorderly low-price malicious competition, and maintain the stable operation of the industry. Strengthen professional talent training and employee training. Widely publicize successful experiences and practices in high-quality development, strengthen negative warnings against illegal and irregular behaviors, and promptly respond to social concerns, creating a favorable public opinion environment.
(III) Focusing on Demonstration and Leadership. Establish a high-quality development evaluation system for casting and forging enterprises, dynamically select industry enterprises with representative achievements and high development quality in intelligent manufacturing, green and low-carbon development, and addressing shortcomings, and cultivate them into benchmark enterprises. Give full play to the demonstration and leading role of benchmark enterprises, conduct in-depth benchmarking and potential tapping work, and lead the high-quality development of the industry.
This opinion shall be implemented from the date of issuance. The original “Notice of the General Office of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the General Office of the National Development and Reform Commission, and the General Office of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment on Strictly Prohibiting the Addition of New Casting Capacity in Key Regions” (MIIT [2019] No. 44) is hereby repealed simultaneously.
Ministry of Industry and Information Technology
National Development and Reform Commission
Ministry of Ecology and Environment
March 30, 2023