Exploring China’s Materialization Process with Economic Transition: Analysis of Raw Material Consumption and Its Socioeconomic Drivers

China’s rapidly growing economy is accelerating its materialization process and thereby creating serious environmental problems at both local and global levels. Understanding the key drivers behind China’s mass consumption of raw materials is thus crucial for developing sustainable resource management and providing valuable insights into how other emerging economies may be aiming to accomplish a low resource-dependent future. Our results show that China’s raw material consumption (RMC) rose dramatically from 11.9 billion tons in 1997 to 20.4 billion tons in 2007, at an average annual growth rate at 5.5%. In particular, nonferrous metal minerals and iron ores increased at the highest rate, while nonmetallic minerals showed the greatest proportion (over 60%). We find that China’s accelerating materialization process is closely related to its levels of urbanization and industrialization, notably demand for raw materials in the construction, services, and heavy manufacturing sectors. The growing domestic final demand level is the strongest contributor of China’s growth in RMC, whereas changes in final demand composition are the largest contributors to reducing it. However, the expected offsetting effect from changes in production pattern and production-related technology level, which should be the focus of future dematerialization in China, could not be found