North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region has announced a plan to build the country's "Rare-Earth Valley" in Baotou city, the largest rare-earth mining area in the world.

The use of "rare earth", which contains 17 elements, can improve or upgrade the quality of other industrial raw materials, and has been widely used in fields like electronics, mechanics, metallurgy, petrochemical and environmental protection.

The "Rare-earth Valley," which will consist of five parks, namely, the Education, Science and Technology, Pioneering, Industrial and Logistics parks, is expected to be a production and development base with global influence within the next 10-15 years.

By 2010, the 50-sq-km area of land is expected to reach a gross industrial output of 42.4 billion yuan (US$5.11 billion), of which more than half will be generated by the rare-earth industry, from basic raw material production to the manufacture of integrated products.

Early this year, the Chinese government invested 60 million yuan (US$7.23 million) in the development of functional rare-earth materials and 180 million yuan (US$21.7 million) in the construction of a 28-story Rare-Earth Plaza.

At the present time, the proven rare-earth deposits in Baotou, in the northern part of the autonomous region, account for 54 percent of the world's total.

In 2001, the output of rare-earth products in Baotou reached 46,600 tons, or 51 percent of the world's total. Most of the products sold very well in more than 20 countries and regions.

(Xinhua News Agency September 17, 2002)