The global race for critical minerals is unfolding with powerful nations prioritizing their national security interests, potentially repeating the damaging patterns of past development initiatives that left ordinary people behind and worsened environmental degradation.
The Green Revolution's Unlearned Lessons
The mid-20th century Green Revolution provides a stark warning. While it successfully boosted food production through high-yield crops, mechanization, and chemical inputs, the benefits were distributed unevenly across societies. Landless farmers faced marginalization while rural ecosystems suffered from excessive fertilizer and irrigation use.
This capital-intensive approach prioritized output over human welfare, further disempowering the poor in several countries including Pakistan. Today, researchers warn that the critical minerals rush could produce similar negative consequences if it continues to ignore the needs of ordinary citizens.
The Geopolitics of Mineral Criticality
A team of researchers writing in Nature recently highlighted the crucial distinction between "critical minerals" and "energy-transition minerals." Most minerals deemed critical by the EU, US, or Australia—including titanium, beryllium, and rare earths used in electronics and defense—have little connection to renewable energy.
Conversely, essential energy-transition minerals like copper often don't appear on these critical lists because they aren't considered supply risks. This reveals a deeper truth: 'criticality' is fundamentally a geopolitical construct rather than an objective classification.
For Global North nations, lithium, cobalt, rare earths, and gallium are essential for maintaining technological and military superiority. Meanwhile, priorities in the Global South differ dramatically. Populous, resource-rich but low-income countries require:
- Gypsum, limestone, potash, and phosphates for housing and food security
- Iron and zinc for nutritional fortification
- Chlorine and fluoride for safe water supplies
- Cement for schools and infrastructure development
Pakistan's Mineral Security Challenge
Many nations possessing 'critical' mineral reserves cannot process these resources domestically. The Democratic Republic of Congo supplies 70% of the world's cobalt for electric vehicle batteries yet controls only a tiny fraction of the industry's value chain.
Similarly, numerous African countries produce millions of tons of minerals vital for fertilizer production but remain heavily dependent on fertilizer imports to meet local agricultural needs.
Pakistan mirrors these troubling asymmetries. Despite possessing abundant copper, coal, salt, limestone, and gypsum reserves, the country imports fertilizer, iron, and steel at substantial cost. For Pakistan and other developing nations, true mineral security means using natural resources to address domestic requirements before supplying global supply chains.
While exporting 'critical minerals' might generate significant revenue for a narrow elite, translating these economic gains into broad societal benefits remains challenging in economies dominated by entrenched interests.
Historical experiences with mineral-driven growth demonstrate clear risks: corruption, elite capture, widening inequality, environmental damage, and conflict. Some nations have attempted to capture more value from domestic resources through strategic industrial policies.
Since 2014, Indonesia has restricted or banned exports of several critical minerals. Ghana, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe have implemented similar measures, while Bolivia and Zambia have substantially increased export taxes, royalties, and fees.
However, such restrictions also risk slowing the global green transition, fueling price volatility, and intensifying trade and geopolitical tensions.
For poorer countries with critical mineral reserves, the surge in global demand represents a significant opportunity to advance economic growth and development. Export revenues from critical minerals could help secure domestic supplies of key minerals needed for agriculture (phosphate, potassium), water treatment (aluminum, copper), and construction (limestone, iron, gypsum).
Industrialized nations must support these mutually beneficial objectives, or the world may witness increased proxy conflicts fueled by maximalist competition for critical resources.
