Indian Rare Earths extract rare earth elements from beaches in Kerala, India.
Pallava Bagla | Corbis News | Getty Images
Like many countries, India is facing restrictions on China’s exports to rare earths, and it hopes to develop its own domestic supply. Experts say it could be an important alternative to China for partners such as the United States, but requires more public and private investment in the industry.
In recent weeks, the world has been struggling to cope with rare earth shortages in light of China’s containment. Automakers in India, the United States, Japan, South Korea and Germany are affected.
In response, Indian officials are evaluating how to use Indian rare earths to increase production of rare earth magnets, Sources told CNBC-TV18.
The report comes just after Indian trade unions and industry minister Piyush Goyal called China’s pause in rare earth elements exports for several days.Wake up the phone“For the world, India has the opportunity to offer alternatives.
Geoffrey Pyatt responded to the Secretary of Commerce’s statement from 2022 to 2025, senior managing director of key minerals and former assistant secretary of U.S. energy resources.
“This is both a wake-up call and an opportunity for us to deepen our India cooperation on issues that are important for future economic competitiveness,” he told CNBC.
China’s dominance
Beijing recently sent a signal Plan mitigation controlUS President Donald Trump said a trade agreement with China includes a resolution on rare earthscomplete. “But China’s control over rare earth elements (REE) is not a new policy, and Gradually restricted International sales occurring in the past two years.
The recent shortage further underlines the country’s dominance in Rees: It Production About 60% of the rare earths are available in the world Processing Almost 90%, which includes materials imported from other countries.
This makes Beijing crucial to a variety of minerals that are critical to a variety of modern technologies, including robots, clean energy, batteries and military equipment.
The potential of India
However, it is important to note that Rees is not unusual in nature. Although China has 44 million tons of REES deposits, India also has a large amount of 6.9 million tons of funds. American Geological Survey. This makes it the reserve after the world’s third largest reserve.
India also has nearly 35% of the world’s beaches and sand deposits, an important source of important rare earths. Recent Reports DK Srivastava, chief policy consultant from EY.
Given these large reserves, India “promising to play a key role in building more diversified global rare earth supply chains,” Gracelin Baskaran, director of the Centre for Key Mineral Safety Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told CNBC.
However, in order to use REE reserves, countries need the ability to mine and extract raw materials, as well as the ability and technology to process and refine them for final use.
In these regions, founded in 1950, Indian Rare Earths could provide a good partner for countries like the United States, Bascalan said, adding that it has no investment from China.
India has also launched National Key Mineral Mission In 2025, the goal is to develop an effective self-reliance framework in the face of China’s restrictions and restrictions and other threats to geographically centralized supply chains.
But, experts say, building domestic capabilities quickly is a difficult task.
“Looking forward, the private sector in R&D in the rare earth sector needs to allocate a lot of other resources,” EY’s Srivastava said in his report.
Sources told CNBC-TV18 The Indian government is also considering working with the private sector of Indian Rare Earths to accelerate domestic capabilities. Options considered include government incentive programs and capital subsidies designed to encourage local mining and processing.
“India will not be able to replace China’s position in the market, but it can certainly play a major role in providing new sources of rare earths,” Baskaran said.
Meanwhile, Industry and Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said India is also looking for other sources, and he hopes Indian companies can obtain China’s import approval as soon as possible.
According to a delegation of the Indian auto industry representatives, they are also preparing for China’s visit to speed up the import of its rare earth magnets. Local Report Quote industry sources.
