In US-China battle over rare earths, developing nations are the frontline

CNA

2 days ago

Former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping once said that 'the Middle East has oil, China has rare earths'. His words carry new weight today as China's stranglehold over the rare earths supply chain gives it leverage in the trade war with the United States.
China controls some 60 per cent of global mining of rare earths, over 85 per cent of their processing, and more than 90 per cent of permanent magnet production – used in everything from cars to medical devices and wind turbines.
That leaves the US and other Western nations vulnerable, and many are now scrambling to diversify their supply chains away from China.
Analysts say that while there are multilateral efforts underway to reduce reliance on China, they are largely diplomatic, and there is a lack of investment or technical expertise to move away from Chinese supply.
They also say that developing countries with rare earths are emerging as the new frontline of a high-stakes contest between China and the West.
"MORE MOMENTUM"
'The United States and other countries have been seeking to diversify for years, and the challenge remains difficult to overcome, yet I think we're seeing more momentum now than in the past,' said Ilaria Mazzocco, deputy director with the Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington.
But she said the issue was that many solutions were long-term, while the threat of export controls was immediate.
A US Department of Defense initiative known as 'mine to magnets' has been accelerated in recent years. The goal is to develop a fully domestic rare earths supply chain – from sourcing and separation to processing, metallisation, alloying and magnet production.
In 2023, the department invested US$258 million in Lynas Rare Earths – the only non-Chinese commercial-scale producer – to open a production facility in Texas. The Australian company achieved a milestone in May this year by producing the heavy rare earth dysprosium oxide at its Malaysian plant – the first time it has been done commercially outside China.
There are other moves afoot by the US and its allies to break China's dominance in the sector.
Washington in 2022 launched the Minerals Security Partnership with 14 partners including Japan, South Korea, India, Britain and Australia. Resource-rich countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Greenland, Kazakhstan and Ukraine are involved in project development and policy dialogue as forum members.
In June, the Group of Seven unveiled a new action plan on critical minerals. And a Quad initiative was launched in July to diversify the critical minerals supply chain.
While there is momentum, analysts say these efforts might not be enough to challenge Beijing's long-standing dominance of the industry.
'Multilateral initiatives, like the G7, Quad and (Minerals Security Partnership) are still largely in a diplomatic stage, ' said Gracelin Baskaran, director of the CSIS Critical Minerals Security Programme.
It is also not clear if the Minerals Security Partnership is a viable alternative to Chinese supply, according to Hu Xinyue, a senior analyst with the China Programme at the S Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore
She said the partnership had seen limited investment and it lacked technical expertise.
'Environmental concerns could be a significant hurdle to developing the partner countries' rare earth mining or production capability,' she added.
Hu said the time it took to get mining projects up and running in the US was another obstacle, noting that it could take 16 years to secure permits and complete construction before production could begin.
OPPORTUNITY AND RISK
There is also a battle playing out over resource-rich developing nations, which are being courted by Chinese and Western investors.
Jonathan Hykawy, president of Stormcrow Capital, a Canada-based equity research firm specialising in rare earths, said China could offer more to these nations than the US, including the size of its market and geopolitical stability.
'The current American presidential administration seems to be using uncertainty and turmoil as some sort of negotiating tactic, but it is difficult to make spending decisions in the face of uncertainty,' he said.
'The US is also making it more difficult for other nations to regard the US as a friend and ally, opening the door to Chinese efforts to do the same.'
Hu in Singapore noted that Beijing's geopolitical playbook included a 'carrot and stick' approach to rare earths – providing tech transfers and access to resources to attract and reward some nations while imposing export controls and other restrictive measures on its geopolitical rivals.
For developing nations with abundant rare earths, this presents both opportunity and risk.
'Chinese companies have a very strong position in the mining and refining of rare earths and so it's no surprise that they also hold a lot of the IP and know-how in this sector,' according to Mazzocco from CSIS.
'As a result, many companies and countries seeking to develop their industry face a dilemma in wanting to collaborate with the biggest players in the business and also seeking to de-risk.'
Baskaran noted that developing a rare earths industry required significant capital and technical expertise. She said many emerging economies were 'non-aligned and looking for the best deal and thus willing to work with China or the West'.
Vietnam holds the world's second-largest known reserves of rare earth minerals, accounting for 19 per cent of global deposits – second only to China.
In 2023, Vietnam and the US signed an agreement to boost technical cooperation on rare earths with the aim of strengthening the Vietnamese industry and attracting foreign investment.
China also wanted a slice of the action, with state-owned China Rare Earth Group pursuing cooperation opportunities with Vietnamese mining giant Vinacomin.
Beijing and Hanoi issued a joint statement in April saying they would explore cooperation on critical minerals.
Malaysia has also become an important link in the supply chain now that Lynas is operating a processing facility there. With substantial rare earth deposits but limited ability to process them, Malaysia is keen to develop its own industry. Its foreign minister in April announced that China had agreed to share some of its processing technology with Malaysia.
Myanmar, meanwhile, is the world's third-largest source of rare earths after China and the US. Its Kachin region is home to some of the world's biggest mines for heavy rare earths, which are exported to China for processing.
Reuters reported last week, citing sources, that the Donald Trump administration had heard proposals aimed at diverting Myanmar's rare earth minerals away from China.
No final decision has been reached, and any effort to implement such plans would likely require Washington to engage in negotiations with the ethnic rebel groups that control much of Myanmar's rare earth reserves.
Hykawy noted that Myanmar and other developing countries were becoming more important as the US-led West and China sought rare earths.
'(Myanmar) pertains to the supply of the heavy rare earths such as dysprosium and terbium, which are important to the manufacture of NdFeB magnets that can be used at higher temperatures, as needed in the automotive industry,' he said.
'But this reliance also carries some risk, as when rare earth concentrate supplies from Myanmar became uncertain in the period following the governmental coup in 2021.'
Cory Combs, head of supply chain research at Trivium China, said the value of the rare earth sector was typically set downstream, and resource-rich countries would have to capture value locally to make full use of their resources.
He said those countries should look to Indonesia's export bans on raw minerals, which encouraged investment in local processing facilities and training local staff to do the jobs required.
"TIME AND MONEY"
Analysts say that while China's strategy of leveraging its rare earth monopoly is highly effective in the short term, it would not last forever as a trade weapon.
Baskaran noted that initiatives including the US defence department's recent partnership with American rare earths company MP Materials would take time to scale up, but they 'effectively set a countdown in motion for developing alternative supply chain options'.
According to Hykawy, 'there is almost no highly proprietary knowledge left in the rare earth space'.
'The actual deposits, the separation technology, the knowledge regarding making rare earth metals, alloys and magnets – all these exist outside China. Putting all this into commercial-scale production is a matter of time and money,' he said.
Building alternative supply chains is far more complex than just identifying new mine sites – it requires a system of processing facilities, manufacturing capabilities and technical expertise.
As a result, Western nations could find it difficult to close the gap even over the longer term, according to Combs.
'Now the world is trying to catch up with where China was yesterday, as it is trying to advance technologically tomorrow,' he said.
However, China's dominance in rare earths has been built up over decades of strategic investment.
Combs said the West should focus on diversifying the supply chain in critical areas, such as components for military equipment.
'There is no world in which the West is able to meaningfully diversify the whole suite of commercial applications (for rare earths),' Combs said.
'It is just too big, the total volume, and China is too far ahead.'