China has announced new curbs on exports of strategic materials

Recently, China made an announcement about new sweeping export controls which targeted five metals which are commonly used across defence, clean energy and other industries. This announcement was made only moments after an additional 10% tariff on Chinese goods came into effect. This tariff was created by the President of the U.S. Donald Trump.

This choice to restrict tungsten, as well as indium and other metals is the most recent attempt China has made to weaponise its dominance when it comes to the mining and processing of a host of critical minerals. These minerals are incredibly important within today’s society, as they are vital to a multitude of things, such as, smartphones, electric car batteries, infrared missiles and even ammunition.

The minerals which have now been restricted by Beijing in some form since 2023 are, Battery, Lithium and Gallium processing technology, Antimony, Gallium, Germanium, rare earth magnet technology and finally, Graphite.

China has proposed the restriction of the export of some technology which has been widely used to manufacture cutting-edge battery components, or process lithium and gallium, which are critical minerals.

Along with this,  the export of three critical minerals to the United States was banned by Beijing. This was performed in response to a new crackdown around China’s chip sector, which was done by Washington. This particular ban only explicitly states that it applies to the United States, however throughout the 18-months prior to this, China had been steadily introducing export licensing regimes around these three specific metals.

When it comes to antimony, which is a strategic metal that is used in flame retardants, as well as solar power equipment and finally munitions, activities such as exports to large buyers, for example, India, Japan and South Korea, had only just restarted, when three months later export licenses were introduced.

Right now, China dominates the supply chain around these three metals and on top of this, the country also either mines or refines between 50-90% of global supply of those minerals.

Back in December 2023, China made the move to ban the export of technology which would go into manufacturing rare earth magnets. Doing this added this technology to a pre-existing ban on technology which is used to extract and separate critical materials. Research has discovered that rare earths are a group of seventeen metals which can be used to make magnets which work to turn power into motion inside electric vehicles, electronics and wind turbines. Although these materials are commonly found within earth’s crust, China has now been able to master the technical difficulty, as well as environmentally harmful refining process. Through utilising this skill, the country is able to produce approximately 90% of global refined output.

It was in October 2023 when China stated it would, ‘require export permits for some graphite products to protect national security.’ It is well known that China is the world’s top graphite producer and exporter, plus the country is also able to refine over 90% of the world’s graphite and turn it into a material which is used in almost all EV batteries.

Currently it is clear that the ever increasing expansion of the restrictions means that Western companies are frantically trying to rejig supply chains, in order to gain access to those affected critical minerals.