At present, the country has a high degree of marketization of plastic pipes and a large number of production and operation enterprises, but mainly small and medium-sized enterprises, the competitiveness of enterprises is weak, the economies of scale are poor, and due to the indifferent brand awareness of the plastic pipe industry, chaotic market order, and unreasonable structure, the production capacity of ordinary pipes with low technical barriers is overcapacity, and the high technical content of urban gas, water supply, drainage and sewage PE pressure pipes and large-caliber plastic pipes can not fully meet the market demand, especially pipe fittings with high technical content and complex production processes, such as fused pipe fittings and PE ball valves, can be produced by fewer manufacturers, able to There are even a few manufacturers that provide a full range of products, and some pipe fittings still need to be imported.In addition, the production of qualified ultra-large-caliber plastic pipes required for large-scale transportation and energy projects at the national level is even more blank.

There are the following major factors that affect the development of the plastic pipe industry：

1. China's plastic pipe enterprises as a whole are relatively small in scale, have insufficient funds, and their technical level is relatively backward.

Although there are a large number of plastic pipe production enterprises in our country, most of them have an annual production capacity of less than 5,000 tons, while the annual output of foreign plastic pipe production enterprises on an economic scale is more than 20,000 tons, and the production capacity ratio of pipes and fittings is unreasonable.At present, the production capacity ratio of pipes and fittings is about 15:1, which is far from the normal application ratio of 8:1, and there are few varieties of pipe fittings.In addition, since plastic pipes are mainly used in infrastructure construction fields such as communications, construction, gas supply, water supply, and drainage, the long project implementation cycle leads to a long payment settlement time, which takes up a lot of working capital and requires the production enterprise to have strong funds.The technical level of China's plastic pipe industry is relatively weak compared with that of developed countries, and there is still a gap between scientific research strength, financial investment, etc. and demand.Especially in terms of plastic pipe processing equipment, mold quality, degree of automation, ensuring production continuity, product quality, extrusion volume, etc., there is still a big gap compared with developed countries, and the international market competitiveness is not strong.

Second, the plastic pipe industry is facing more fierce competition.

Compared with large international plastic pipe production enterprises, domestic enterprises are at obvious disadvantages in terms of capital, technology, management, and scale. Large foreign plastic pipe production enterprises may adopt joint ventures, sole proprietorships, and cooperation to invest and build factories in China, and the market competition will be more fierce.Domestic enterprises must seize the favorable opportunity for the development of our country's market, actively expand the scale of production, reduce production costs, and achieve economies of scale; improve the technical level, increase product categories, improve product structure, meet the diversified needs of the market, and enhance risk resistance and market competitiveness.In addition, the transportation cost of plastic pipes is higher, and a certain sales radius is often formed due to the transportation distance, which hinders the development and growth of plastic pipe enterprises to a certain extent.

3. The main raw materials are dependent on imports, and prices fluctuate greatly.

The research and development of domestic plastic pipe raw materials has greatly lagged behind the development of the plastic pipe industry.Compared with foreign countries, the main manifestations are: there are few special resin grades and insufficient supply of raw materials; product quality is unstable; product specifications and varieties are not matched; and the development of various high-performance varieties and grades is not strong enough.At present, only a few resin production plants in China produce special materials for pipes, and the annual import of special materials for pipes is equivalent to the domestic production volume, resulting in the basic dependence on imports of PE, PEX and other raw materials, the production of PE special materials supply and demand imbalance, PVC market gap is large.In order to fundamentally reverse the imbalance between supply and demand for the production of special resins for pipes, our country proposed in the “Tenth Five-Year Plan” and the 2015 long-term plan; according to the needs of the processing performance of plastic products in our country, develop special varieties, and immediately domestic, accelerate the development of a special resin production system to ensure the processing performance and quality of products.At present, large domestic chemical companies such as Shanghai Petrochemical can produce special resins for pipes such as PE80 and PE100. With the development of special materials for domestic plastic pipes, the situation of relying on imports of the main raw materials in China's plastic pipe industry will improve.

In addition, the raw material used in plastic pipes is polyethylene (PE), which is a downstream product of the petrochemical industry, and its price is greatly affected by price fluctuations in the international crude oil market.Since 2003, the price of the international crude oil market has shown an upward trend, which has led to an increase in the price of polyethylene (PE) and an increase in the production cost of plastic pipe enterprises, which is not conducive to the stable development of plastic pipe production enterprises.