Critical Minerals

Question

4. Critical Minerals 1. Australia is building a $1.2 billion Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve targeting antimony, gallium, and rare earths at the same time China is restricting exports of those minerals and Australia is losing operating processing capacity, with Kemerton idled, Liberty Bell Bay in administration, and Nyrstar in uncertain negotiations. a. Does the Department accept that Australia is simultaneously losing domestic processing capacity and becoming structurally more dependent on Chinese supply chains? b. Will the Reserve stockpile Australian-processed material, or processed material purchased from China? c. Has the Department conducted a comprehensive supply-chain dependency assessment across the clean energy and defence sectors quantifying Australia's net dependency on Chinese supply? If so, can it be tabled? If not, on what basis is the Future Made in Australia agenda being delivered without it? 2. The Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve was announced on 12 January 2026 with a target of being operational by the end of 2026. Budget Paper No. 2 confirms $173.3 million over five years, including $150 million for selective stockpiling, with partial funding held in the Contingency Reserve. a. Is the Reserve operational? Has it secured any rights to Australian-produced antimony, gallium or rare earth elements, and if so from which producers, at what volumes, and on what terms? b. Has the Reserve on-sold any of those rights to international demand partners, and to which countries or companies? c. Has any physical stockpiling commenced, and what is currently held in the Reserve? d. Has the legislation to expand Export Finance Australia's powers been introduced, and has it passed? e. Does the Contingency Reserve treatment mean the $150 million has not yet been released? What criteria must be met before it is? 3. The US-Australia Critical Minerals Framework signed on 20 October 2025 committed each government to more than US$1 billion within six months, against a target pipeline of approximately US$8.5 billion. The six-month window closed in April 2026. a. Has Australia deployed its full commitment? Can the Department provide a full list of Australian-supported projects under the framework and the amount committed to each? b. How much of the target pipeline has been formally committed to date? c. Given trade disputes between Australia and the United States over steel and aluminium tariffs during this period, does the Government have confidence the United States will honour its commitments under the framework? d. What risk assessment has the Government undertaken of how China might respond to the framework, and has DFAT modelled the trade consequences? 6 4. China has progressively restricted exports of gallium and germanium in August 2023, antimony in September 2024, and rare earths through 2025. a. What has been the practical impact on Australian companies that use these materials? Has any Australian manufacturer been unable to source antimony or gallium as a result? b. Has the Government assessed the risk of losing domestic antimony production, for example at Nyrstar's Port Pirie operations, while building the strategic reserve? c. Does the Government consider manganese a critical mineral for strategic reserve purposes, given that if Liberty Bell Bay closes all downstream manganese smelting will occur overseas? If not, why not?

Answer

See attached response.

Documents

• Question with answer (PDF) (opens in a new tab)
• BI-027_Liddle_Critical Minerals_DISR.pdf (opens in a new tab)