Canada Bets On State-Backed Mining To Break China’s Grip On Critical Minerals
Canada is moving from cheerleader of global markets to active shareholder in the mines and processing plants that feed modern industry, launching an aggressive plan to secure supplies of critical minerals now dominated by China.
Ottawa intends to buy equity stakes, offer loan guarantees and sign long-term purchase contracts with a handful of mining and refining projects judged “strategic” but struggling to raise private capital in a market distorted by China’s scale and pricing power.
The new strategy is anchored in a C$2 billion sovereign critical-minerals fund that will back projects in lithium, nickel, graphite, scandium and rare earths such as terbium and dysprosium.
These metals are embedded in electric motors, smartphones, wind turbines and advanced weapons systems. Canada is already fast-tracking projects like Nouveau Monde Graphite’s expansion in Quebec, Canada Nickel’s Crawford project in Ontario and a tungsten-molybdenum mine in New Brunswick.
News of government support has sent some of these companies’ shares sharply higher, signalling investor relief that big-ticket projects may finally get the capital and infrastructure they need.
Behind the funding lies a more hard-edged move: Canada has begun building strategic stockpiles of minerals like graphite and scandium and is openly studying reserves in other niche metals.
Canada joins U.S. in securing critical minerals
Together with fellow G7 countries, Ottawa wants supply chains that do not run almost entirely through Chinese mines, refineries and magnet factories.
For years, Western governments assumed global trade would keep these inputs flowing; now they are treating them more like oil in the 1970s – a vulnerability that can be weaponised.
Canada’s shift parallels moves in the United States, where Washington has put public money into rare-earth producer MP Materials, lithium developer Lithium Americas and other strategic miners.
For readers in Brazil and elsewhere, the message is clear: the age of hands-off globalization in raw materials is ending.
Countries that can offer stable rules, serious geology and credible partners will compete to anchor this new, security-driven supply network – and those that hesitate may find that the most valuable parts of the green and tech economy are locked up for decades to come.
This article was produced by The Rio Times’ automated newsroom system. How we use AI · Report an error · Editorial responsibility: Matthias Camenzind, Editor-in-Chief