LONDON (Reuters) -China Nonferrous Metal Mining Group (CNMC) is preparing to set up three stockpiles, containing rare and precious metals and “scattered” metals with a low concentration in the Earth’s crust, its vice general manager said on Tuesday.
“We’re planning to do that,” Fan Wei, the state-owned miner’s vice general manager, told Reuters on the sidelines of the China Nonferrous Metals Forum, part of the annual LME Week gathering in London.
In his presentation to the forum, Fan said that CNMC planned to prioritise development of 14 types of metals, including tantalum, niobium, beryllium, platinum group metals and indium.
He said there were no details yet on the preferred location or capacities for the stockpiles.
Fan’s comments come as competition is heating up for critical minerals – prized for their use in consumer electronics and defence applications – and as new Chinese export controls on rare earths cause trade tensions with the United States.
China is by far the world’s leading producer of rare earth metals.
The metals will come from all over the world, Fan said, adding that CNMC planned to build recycling facilities for them. Outside China, CNMC has mining assets in Africa, including in Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
(Reporting by Tom Daly and Amy Lv; Editing by Jan Harvey)
