So, like, despite this recent deal with the US, Ukraine is gonna take, like, years before they can even come close to rivaling China as, like, a top source of critical minerals for the US. Analysts are saying that American companies are gonna be scrambling to find these materials because China is, like, restricting their supply due to trade disputes and stuff.
Most of Ukraine’s mineral stores are, like, in parts of the country that are occupied by Russia after, like, more than three years of war. And the rest of the minerals are gonna take, like, years to extract because they don’t have enough processing capacity.
China, on the other hand, has, like, 60 per cent of the world’s reserves of rare earth elements and is responsible for, like, 90 per cent of all refining. They produced, like, 270,000 tonnes of rare earths last year, according to the US Geological Survey. That’s, like, a lot.
This professor of economics, Liang Yan, from Willamette University in the US, was saying that Ukraine doesn’t even compare to China in terms of scale. She was like, “Ukraine doesn’t have tens of billions of mineral deposits. It’s also not just about the mineral deposit reserves, it’s also about processing power.” So, like, Ukraine is definitely behind on this whole minerals game.
Ukraine and the US finally signed this minerals deal after, like, two months of tough negotiations. The White House was all like, “This is a continuation of our commitment to Ukraine.” They’re setting up this fund to receive, like, 50 per cent of royalties and stuff from natural resource projects in Ukraine. The Donald Trump administration was all about that “economic security” as the main reason for the deal.
So, yeah, it’s gonna be a while before Ukraine can catch up to China in the minerals game. But, like, at least they’re making some progress with this new deal. Not really sure why this matters, but hey, it’s news, right?
And that’s the story of Ukraine, China, and the US in the world of critical minerals. It’s gonna be interesting to see how this all plays out in the end.
