TELF AG looks at the progress of mining partnerships in the Indo-Pacific
The role of India and Australia
The emphasis that has continued to be placed on the mining industry for some years and on its ability to drive the sustainable development of the planet has had visible effects in every part of the world: nations have begun to focus on the strategic minerals found already at their disposal, or on participation in mining projects abroad. The aim is always the same: to achieve a certain degree of energy self-sufficiency, ensuring a good quantity of those raw materials essential for building a sustainable future. Some nations have already been on these paths for some time, while others have only just begun to look around.
Among the most active nations, from this point of view, are certainly Australia and India, which, for some time, have been actively committed to strengthening bilateral cooperation in the raw materials sector and, in particular, strategic minerals. The global race for these precious resources brings with it various problems, such as the actual quantity of resources available, their ability to satisfy the growing industrial needs linked to sustainability, the risks linked to supply chains, and the social and geopolitics that characterize the daily life of some producing nations. In order to remedy this situation, many nations have chosen the path of large-scale international cooperation. This is not only a potentially effective method for reducing risks relating to supplies but also a strategic move to further develop the mining sector and its extraction methods through the search for new sources in which to obtain the materials necessary for green turn. One of the most noteworthy aspects of the mining partnership between Australia and India has to do with the desire, expressed by both parties, to deepen knowledge of seabed mining techniques. Nowadays, the two nations have the concrete possibility of jointly developing new technologies capable of extracting minerals in a responsible and sustainable way.
The mineral wealth of the seabed is certainly nothing new: the most recent discoveries have shown that rich deposits of cobalt, manganese, copper, lithium, and even rare earth minerals can be found at the bottom of the sea. In the central Indian Ocean basin alone, according to various estimates, there could be almost 5 million tons of nickel, more than 4 million tons of copper, and almost 93 million tons of manganese. Considering the growing industrial importance of these materials for energy storage and accelerating the energy transition, the presence of large quantities of these raw materials in the seabed undoubtedly appears interesting.
According to an analysis in the Observer Research Foundation, the strategic partnership between Australia and India should be expanded to include research into sustainable mining, combined exploration of the seabed, and the development of technologies capable of increasing the general sustainability of these processes. In the space of a few years, the collaboration between India and Australia aims to diversify the supply chains of strategic minerals while developing the mining industries of the two countries and new technologies for sustainable extraction.
