In the early 1980s, due to multiple exports and self-competition, China's export volume of
tungsten products was difficult to control. To protect and rationally develop and cherish tungsten resources, improve the economic benefit, in 1993 the state secondary ammonium tungstate, partial acid ammonium tungstate, such as tungsten, tungsten trioxide, their names tungsten oxide and hydroxide, smelting and intermediate products such as tungsten powder and tungsten carbide powder export quotas and licenses, and tungsten products export quota in about 17000 t, and banned tungsten concentrate exports in 2000.
From the changes of export product structure, we can see that China's export of tungsten products has realized the transformation from tungsten concentrate to tungsten smelting products, and then to processed products. In 1985, the export volume of tungsten concentrate accounted for 61% of the total export volume, tungstate and tungsten iron each accounted for 16%, and the total of the three accounted for 93%.In 1995, the export volume of quota tungsten products accounted for 95% of the total export volume, among which tungsten salt accounted for 74%.Since the beginning of the 21st century, the export of tungstate has decreased, and the export of tungsten oxide and tungsten carbide has increased. In 2016, tungstate exports fell to 13%, with tungsten oxide accounting for 26%, cemented carbide 21%, tungsten carbide 16% and tungsten iron 6%.
