Future Supplies Of Rems From China Remain Headline News In The Media

The twists and turns of the Chinese Rare Earth Metals story have continued with a

hotly debated story in the first week of July 2012 that the country is planning to reserve four of the most important REMs for its own national stockpile.

The story is alleged to have been published in Chinese national news, but as the week unfolded a report direct from Shanghai identified the source as the China Enterprise News, but also said that the article contained no details of specific REMs to be stockpiled, and other sources have named them as dysprosium, europium, terbium and yttrium.

The correspondent from Shanghai is also quoted as saying there were no indications of which companies would be included in stockpiling in exchange for interest free loans.

Other reports around the REMworld have suggested that the Chinese government is "considering" the stockpiling in the near future and has not set any dates.

Clearly there are questions about the whole issue, not least whether China would take a risk like this when its March decision to restrict export quotas of REMs is already under scrutiny by the World Trade Organisation, which was created to ensure fair trade among its 153 members.

The conflicting and scarce information on this story means that it is also impossible to tell whether such stockpiling would mean it would totally ban all exports of REMs, of which Chinese production amounts to more than 95% of the world's supplies. It all may be pure speculation or even scaremongering on the basis that China had previously warned in a government paper that its stocks were rapidly depleting.

There there does not appear to have been any reaction to the story from either Europe, Japan or the USA, for whose manufacturing activity a supply of REMs is essential for production of sophisticated hi tech appliances such as mobile phones, televisions, PCs and batteries for hybrid cars. The governments of these three already raised the issue of Chinese export restrictions with the WTO, which is currently investigating.

Meanwhile in other REM news, scepticism had been expressed about the feasibility and viability of extracting mud from the sea floor off Japan, which had recently announced the results of tests on the mud and its high concentration of REMs.

This does not, however, seem to have deterred China applying to the International Sea Bed Authority (ISBA) for and receiving permits for similar explorations of the seas bed in the Indian Ocean.

It is obvious from all this news activity is that the importance of REMS to various economies' manufacturing around the world, as well as to the future development of clean earth technology continues to be considerable and has succeeded in placing developments firmly on the mainstream media agenda.

It could be argued that this attention also suggests that REMs will continue to be an attractive investment opportunit.

Copyright (c) 2012 Alison Withers

by: Alison Withers

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