On September 11, the 5th Bohai Rim Steel Industry Association Integration and Development Conference & Liaoning Province Steel Supply Chain Platform Launch Event was grandly convened in Anshan. This event was guided by the Liaoning Provincial Department of Industry and Information Technology, Liaoning Provincial Department of Commerce, and Liaoning Provincial State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission; hosted by Ansteel Group Co., Ltd. and Anshan Metallurgical Industry Group Co., Ltd., with co-hosts including Deling Land Port Supply Chain Service Co., Ltd., Ltd. and other entities; organized by the People’s Government of Lishan District (Anshan City), Anshan Steel Service Industry Association, and Shanghai Ganglian E-Commerce Co., Ltd.; and co-organized by The Internet and Digitalization Special Committee, Sheet Metal Processing Branch, and Welded Pipe Branch of China National Association of Metal Material Trade(CAMT).

A total of over 400 participants attended the conference, including leaders from local provincial, municipal, and district government departments, heads of steel industry associations in the Bohai Rim region, and representatives from relevant enterprises.

Chen Leiming, Executive President and Secretary-General of CAMT, was invited to the conference and delivered a keynote speech entitled Strengthening the Foundation and Upholding the Essence: The Fundamental Approach for Steel Circulation Enterprises to Mitigate Risks.

In his speech, Chen Leiming acknowledged the prominent contributions of steel circulation enterprises to multiple domains, including the advancement of China’s steel industry, infrastructure construction, and the development of industry and manufacturing. He further identified the risk sources faced by these enterprises, which encompass international factors, domestic factors, and internal corporate factors. He explicitly noted that while the risk incidents encountered by steel circulation enterprises in the past two years appear to stem from external factors on the surface, their root causes lie within the enterprises themselves—specifically, weak risk prevention awareness, inadequate risk prevention and control systems and mechanisms, and a lack of modern risk prevention and control technologies and systems.

Chen Leiming emphasized that “strengthening the foundation and upholding the essence” serves as the survival strategy for withstanding the “harsh winter” (i.e., industry downturns). The term “strengthening the foundation” refers to consolidating fundamental elements: originally denoting the maintenance of the functions of the innate and acquired foundations of the human body in traditional Chinese medicine, it is broadly extended to mean reinforcing the foundational underpinnings of an entity. For steel circulation enterprises, during periods of industry troughs, the primary imperative is to maintain strategic focus, adhere to their core business, avoid being distracted by non-essential opportunities, refrain from arbitrary business transformation, and, crucially, steer clear of misaligned development paths. The term “upholding the essence” refers to preserving vital energy (Yuanqi) to prevent its dissipation—originally signifying the maintenance of the body’s inherent life force and avoidance of excessive depletion, it translates to maintaining the core operational integrity of enterprises. For steel circulation enterprises, this entails upholding critical bottom lines, such as financial stability, compliance with legal regulations, and adherence to environmental protection standards.

Chen Leiming put forward the following targeted recommendations for risk mitigation in steel circulation enterprises:

"Systematic Caging: Institutionalizing Risk Safeguards" – establishing standardized risk prevention systems and mechanisms to embed "risk insurance" into organizational operations;

"Strategic Vigilance: Prudent Partner Screening" – implementing rigorous due diligence processes to select high-reliability collaborators;

"Financial Prudence: Zero-Risk Capital Management" – ensuring full risk coverage for all capital flows to eliminate potential financial vulnerabilities;

"Tool Empowerment: Market Risk Hedging via Derivatives" – leveraging futures and derivative instruments to mitigate price volatility and market uncertainties.

Chen Leiming emphasized in particular that the market is perpetually permeated with risks, yet the majority of enterprises can identify fraudulent schemes and resist risks—this is strongly correlated with the soundness and standardized operation of their internal risk management systems and mechanisms. Only by adhering to institutional governance, following rule-based procedures, enabling systematic supervision, implementing multi-layered risk safeguards, subjecting all processes to oversight, integrating risk points across all links and checkpoints into the risk management system, and ensuring the full implementation of responsibilities can the occurrence of risk events be avoided. Notably, the most likely perpetrators of system erosion are the system formulators themselves. In this regard, enterprise "top leaders" must take the lead in setting an example and strictly enforcing institutional requirements.