By Brendon Lau
China’s largest mining association has weighed in to the political debate by lashing out at the Labor government’s mining tax, which it blames for the drop off in Chinese investments in Australia.
While the vice president of the China Mining Association, Wang JiaHua, did not mention the tax by name at the Melbourne Mining Club lunch this afternoon, he said that “confusing financial tax” is one of the four reasons for the pull back in Chinese mining investments in this country.
Speaking in Mandarin through a translator, Mr Wang went on to point out that the lack of infrastructure development, China’s lack of understanding about labour and indigenous issues, and the failure of some large scale mining projects were also impeding Chinese capital inflows.
One of the solutions he suggested was to allow cross investments between Australian miners and Chinese companies buying the raw material.
Mr Wang also stressed that China and Australia needed to forge a closer relationship and mentioned the term “win-win” no less than five times during his 45 minute speech, which ended with a slide saying “We can only move ahead by joining hands”.
“The view that what China sells is cheap and what China buys is expensive is not sustainable,” Mr Wang said.
His call for a more congenial relationship between commodity consumers and producers coincides with reports that BHP Billiton’s boss, Andrew Mckenzie, has brushed off calls by China’s leaders to lower iron ore prices.
