BEIJING: The United States’ malicious attempts to suppress China have caused a huge blow to the global photovoltaic industry and there is no so-called forced labor in any enterprise in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, a spokesman for the regional government said.
The concentration of photovoltaic production capacity is the result of resource distribution, technological difference, market drive and other factors, Xu Guixiang, spokesman for the regional government, said at a news conference held in Beijing.
“It (the concentration of photovoltaic production capacity) is a normal phenomenon of the development of the international photovoltaic industry, and also a universal law of the development of many international industries,” said Xu.
The fragility of the global photovoltaic industry and supply chain has been caused by the US’ implementation of the so-called Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act to suppress China’s photovoltaic industry.
The actions of the US seriously violate market rules and World Trade Organization rules, undermine the international trade order and interfere with the cooperation and development of the global photovoltaic industry, he said.
Under the act, which passed at the end of 2021 and took effect in June, US Customs and Border Protection will block all imports made wholly or partly in Xinjiang, citing “forced labor” as the reason.
The production of polysilicon, a key raw material in the solar photovoltaic industry, is not a labor-intensive industry, but a technology－and capital-intensive one. Xu said polysilicon enterprises in Xinjiang have reached the international first-class level and achieved a high degree of automation and digitalization.
“5G technology has been fully applied in production. Most operations in the factory are done by computers and there is no need for a large number of manual workers,” he said.
–The Daily Mail-China Daily news exchange item
