G7 countries, with the exception of Japan, are heavily or exclusively reliant on China for a raft of materials from rare earth magnets to battery metals…To address the security risk, G7 leaders launched a Critical Minerals Action Plan in June. Technical teams met in Chicago earlier this month…The sources said officials were considering price floors backed by government subsidies, which the U.S. recently introduced to encourage domestic production. Australia is separately considering setting a price floor to support critical minerals projects, including rare earths…One of the sources added that Canada looked favourably on the price floor idea, though had not committed to such a move. A fourth source, an EU official not authorised to speak publicly on the topic, said the bloc was exploring various ideas such as price floors, joint-purchasing and reciprocal deals within the G7, but that no decisions had been taken.

Today, the threat from the flood of cheap Chinese imports goes far beyond the United States automotive industry and is far more dangerous than the threat posed by cheap imports of the past. Unlike Japan in the 1980s, China is playing according to a wide range of non-market practices: intellectual property (IP) theft and forced knowledge transfer, monopolization and vertical integration, massive state subsidies and market protection, suppressed wages and forced labor, and global price manipulation and dumping…Using these non-market methods, China has systematically cornered the technology at the heart of next-generation vehicles and mobility: lithium batteries. China’s advanced battery dominance was developed through decades of other non-market practices. Its battery bottleneck also represents a clear and present danger to the security of our military supply chains, the resilience of our core industries, and the efficient functioning of market economies around the globe…According to the Department of Defense, advanced lithium batteries are “essential to thousands of military systems” from drones and lasers to handheld radios and night vision goggles. Batteries are at the heart of high tech, powering laptops and cell phones, and are vital for the power tools on construction sites. Large-scale battery systems are beginning to back up factories, homes, military bases, and entire electrical grids…China makes 80 percent of the world’s lithium-ion batteries, but that dominance is only the beginning of the problem. China makes 85 percent of the world’s lithium-based anodes and 70 percent of the cathodes. They make 90 percent of the materials used in those cathodes and 97 percent of the material for anodes. They process 80 percent of the world’s lithium, 85 percent of the world’s battery-grade cobalt, and 95 percent of the world’s battery-grade graphite. China has actively manipulated international nickel prices and controls global lithium prices, using its power to push out competitors and further concentrate monopoly power…We must ramp up the extraction and processing of critical minerals, stabilize prices, and constrain China’s manipulations. The United States needs to support innovation and the scaling of new battery technologies, as well as to improve the transparency of supply chains. Critically, we also need a new coalition of allies and partners to fortify and diversify critical supply chains and blunt China’s monopoly power.

Chemaf Resources Ltd. put itself up for sale more than two years ago after financial troubles left the company unable to complete development projects. The firm – backed by Trafigura Group – abandoned a transaction with a unit of Chinese state-owned arms manufacturer Norinco Group in March after Congo withheld the necessary approvals…“We have intensified our efforts to identify a suitable investor,” Chemaf chairman Shiraz Virji said in an email sent to employees on Sept. 16. However, “significant and unsustainable financial pressure” means the company will cease production and related operations at the end of November “if no investor is in place,” according to the email, which was seen by Bloomberg News…The company produced a modest 20,000 tons of copper last year, but is building what would become one of the world’s largest cobalt mines – the two metals are extracted together in Congo…The sale to Norin Mining was scrapped six months ago after Congo’s state miner Gecamines – which owns the permit Chemaf leases for its flagship Mutoshi project – objected to the deal. US officials also urged President Felix Tshisekedi’s administration to prevent the transfer to the Chinese firm…Congo — which mines about three-quarters of the world’s cobalt — has banned exports of the metal used in electric-vehicle batteries as well as the aerospace and defense industries.

Mr. David Massola has rejoined the Company as Vice President, Business Development to assist with the transition of the vertically integrated NICO cobalt-gold-bismuth-copper critical minerals project (“NICO Project”) to project finance and development. David Massola is a seasoned mining industry financial executive with decades of experience working for large multinational mining and processing companies, junior mining companies, and developers, including significant work in Canada’s northern territories. Dave will be based in Toronto and will help the Company with its strategic and financial planning, assist with joint ventures, corporate and project finance, and he will lead the negotiations for First Nation Participation Agreements and business relationships…David Massola’s financial and business acumen will complement Fortune as the Company advances the NICO Project to a construction decision. The NICO Project is a development stage asset comprised of a planned mine and concentrator in the NWT and a dedicated hydrometallurgical facility in Alberta where concentrates from the mine, and other feed sources, will be processed to make cobalt sulphate, gold doré, bismuth ingots, and copper cement for the energy transition, new technologies and defence. The NICO Project will produce value-added products from three critical minerals, and there is 1.1 million ounces of in-situ gold in the deposit as a countercyclical co-product to mitigate metal price volatility.