as a trade war between the US and China
rages on the US Defense Department has
submitted a report to Congress on rare
earth minerals as it hopes to reduce
America's reliance in China's vast
supplies now this comes after China's
state media and Wednesday suggested it
may play a new card restricting us
access to rare earth minerals the
chemical elements that are widely used
in everything from mobile phones and
other consumer electronics to wind
turbines MRI machines and military
hardware
EMG reports rare earth minerals are a
group of 17 chemical elements which are
used in a wide range of consumer
products from electric car motors to
smartphones as well as military jet
engines satellites and lasers with
simmering trade tensions between the
United States and China it has raised
concerns in Washington that Beijing
could use its dominant position as the
world's main supplier of rare earths as
leverage with that the US Defense
Department submitted a report to
Congress this week with a plan for a
federal program designed to bolster
production capabilities through targeted
economic incentives while the Pentagon
did not provide details it's hoped the
plan will reduce America's reliance on
China currently China supplies about 80
percent of US imports of the minerals
most rare earth minerals mined outside
of China still end up there for
processing with the lone u.s. mined in
California also sending its material to
China due to this China has used rare
earth minerals as leverage in its trade
talks raising tariffs to 25 percent from
the previous 10 percent while the u.s.
excluded the elements from its own list
of prospective tariffs on roughly 300
billion dollars worth of Chinese goods
to be targeted in its next wave of
tariff measures experts say despite the
u.s. plan to produce alternative rare
earth supplies it's not something that
can happen overnight as China will use
its stronghold on the minerals as a
powerful bargaining chip
easing J Arirang news
