{"text":[[{"start":7.84,"text":"Western critical minerals projects are being hamstrung by public funding gaps, impeding their ability to challenge China’s chokehold on materials essential to tech and defence manufacturing, according to a new report."}],[{"start":20.4,"text":"According to the SAFE Center for Critical Minerals Strategy, an NGO, the west’s ability to boost its supply chains now hinges less on access to plentiful geological resources than on addressing “a persistent financing gap” from public entities."}],[{"start":35.68,"text":"Critical minerals often require 20 to 30 years of investment and operating certainty, without which private capital is reluctant to commit. Stronger commitments from government-backed lenders would encourage private investors and banks to back critical minerals projects, the report said."}],[{"start":54,"text":"“Governments have spent the last several years agreeing that critical minerals dependency is a strategic problem. The harder work now is proving that public finance institutions can actually get capital into the ground, into processing facilities, and into the hands of developers fast enough to matter,” said Abigail Hunter, executive director of the Center for Critical Minerals Strategy."}],[{"start":74.72,"text":"China controls more than 90 per cent of the world’s processing capacity for rare earths and critical minerals such as cobalt, nickel and lithium, which are essential for batteries and weapons."}],[{"start":85.68,"text":"Between 2001 and 2023 China poured about $94bn into overseas critical minerals projects, helping it secure a dominant position in refining and processing."}],[{"start":97.36,"text":"The International Energy Agency estimates more than $500bn in critical minerals investment will be needed to secure western policy goals."}],[{"start":107.44,"text":"The trade war between the US and China and the Iran war have made achieving self-sufficiency a strategic goal. Since 2024 China has placed export restrictions on minerals such as antimony and tungsten. The price of tungsten, an important input of missiles and ammunition, has soared 70 per cent since the war started."}],[{"start":126.96,"text":"The US has moved more aggressively in recent years to finance critical minerals in unconventional ways. In July 2025 the defence department extended a $150mn loan to MP Materials, a rare earths producer and magnet manufacturer, and made a $400mn equity investment in the company. The administration also set a price floor for certain minerals and an offtake backstop for all magnets produced over the next 10 years, and similar price floor commitments with Lynas Rare Earths and a joint venture of MP Materials and Saudi mining company Maaden."}],[{"start":161.038,"text":"The International Development Finance Corporation has deployed $1.2bn of equity financing for critical minerals in 2026."}],[{"start":169.073,"text":"However, funding has been undercut by mandate mismatches, since many export credit agencies and development finance institutions were built to promote exports and development, not resource security."}],[{"start":182.08,"text":"And public finance institutions are expected to be responsible stewards of taxpayer money. Since many projects may be difficult to justify, some lenders were “rationalising this risk”, said Milo McBride, a fellow in the sustainability, climate and geopolitics programme at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace."}],[{"start":197.76,"text":"“It’s a massive question,” he said. Was the point of public funding “supposed to be return on investment, or for grander national geostrategic interests? And are there ways to overlap those?”"}],[{"start":212.24,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1785217983_4381.mp3"}