Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2667 actions· ✨ 89 recent

On 20 May 2026 President Prabowo Subianto signed a Government Regulation (Peraturan Pemerintah tentang Tata Kelola Ekspor Komoditas Sumber Daya Alam) establishing PT Danantara Sumber Daya Indonesia (DSI) — a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Danantara sovereign-investment holding company — as the sole legal exporter ("eksportir tunggal") for palm oil (CPO and derivatives), thermal and metallurgical coal, and ferroalloys (ferronickel, nickel pig iron, ferromanganese, ferrochrome), representing approximately USD 65 billion in annual Indonesian export proceeds. A phased implementation architecture applies: a transition period from 1 June through 31 August 2026 during which private exporters continue direct contractual relationships but must route all export documentation through DSI as the mandatory single-window reporting layer; followed by full implementation from 1 September 2026 under which DSI assumes the entire export chain including contract negotiation, buyer relationship, shipment booking, and payment receipt. The stated rationale is to strengthen export-flow oversight, eliminate under-invoicing and transfer-pricing-driven capital flight, and improve DHE-SDA foreign-exchange retention compliance.

On 6 February 2026 South African Trade, Industry and Competition Minister Parks Tau and Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao signed the Framework Agreement on Economic Partnership for Shared Prosperity (CAEPA) in Pretoria. The framework — non-binding by design — covers four pillars: trade, investment, new-energy, and multilateral cooperation. China commits to provide duty-free access to South African exports under a follow-on Early Harvest Agreement (EHA) scheduled for conclusion by the end of March 2026; a progressive reduction of the 10% Chinese MFN tariff on South African fruit is already underway with full duty-free treatment for fruit scheduled for 1 May 2026. The signing took place against the backdrop of US "reciprocal" tariff pressure on South African exports (30% threatened, ~30,000 jobs at risk) and AGOA preference uncertainty, positioning China as a counterweight market. CAEPA is the first China-Africa bilateral framework structured as a quasi-FTA precursor rather than a FOCAC-style aid/concessional package.

The Ivorian Council of Ministers adopted on 3 December 2025 the Politique Intégrée des Ressources Minérales et de l'Énergie (PIRME), a 15-year cross-sector extractive and energy industrial-policy strategy requiring CFA 38,000 billion (~USD 68bn) across three five-year phases to 2040. The policy targets doubling the mining-energy sector's GDP contribution from 7% (2022) to 14% by 2040, positioning it as the economy's second pillar after agriculture. Core mandates include a 50% local transformation target for gold, a 10 million-tonne iron-ore production target, a 500,000 bbl/day oil production target, 45% renewable energy integration, and a 38% reduction in energy-sector emissions — backed by national-content and value-addition requirements across mining, hydrocarbons, and electricity sub-sectors.

Law No. 7554 (Bazı Kanunlarda Değişiklik Yapılmasına Dair Kanun), adopted by the Grand National Assembly on 19 July 2025 and published in Resmî Gazete No. 32965 on 24 July 2025, amends Mining Law No. 3213 to introduce the first statutory definition of "stratejik ve kritik madenler" (strategic and critical minerals) in Turkish law. The law creates a Board override mechanism chaired by a Vice-Presidential delegate that can compel permit issuance for strategic/critical mineral projects when lower authorities have refused, designates MAPEG as the licensing authority within one month of a favourable Board decision, and mandates EIA Positive Decisions for all in-scope projects (eliminating the prior "EIA Not Required" option). Transitional provisions preserve old-regime rules for existing licence-holders until 1 January 2026.

The Gabonese Council of Ministers on 30 May 2025 adopted a decision prohibiting all exports of raw (crude) manganese ore effective 1 January 2029, requiring that all manganese mined in Gabon be processed domestically before export. A Commission has been established to draft the implementing regulation, and the Ministry of Industry and Local Transformation is working with COMILOG (Eramet) on transition modalities including the planned Moanda ferromanganese plant (300 kt/yr capacity). The measure applies to the world's #2 manganese producer (~25% of global reserves; ~8 Mt/yr current output, the bulk via COMILOG-Eramet), forcing upstream beneficiation onto Eramet/COMILOG, CITIC, and Ningbo Steel. The ban is the flagship industrial-policy instrument of the "Gabon Industriel 2035" national strategy under President Brice Clotaire Oligui Nguema.

Presidential Executive Order 14285, signed by President Trump on 24 April 2025 and published at 90 FR 17735, directs federal agencies to expedite US seabed critical-mineral exploration and extraction both within the US Outer Continental Shelf and in international waters beyond national jurisdiction. NOAA is to fast-track Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Act (30 U.S.C. § 1401) exploration licences and commercial recovery permits; BOEM is to streamline OCS Lands Act prospecting permits and leases; Interior, Defense, and Energy are to identify seabed-derived critical minerals for the National Defense Stockpile and DPA Title III financial assistance. The order asserts unilateral US authority to permit deep-sea mining beyond national jurisdiction outside the UNCLOS / International Seabed Authority framework, with most agency reports due within 60 days of signing.

On 25 March 2025 the European Commission adopted the first list of 47 Strategic Projects inside the EU under Article 7 of the Critical Raw Materials Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1252), followed on 4 June 2025 by 13 Strategic Projects located in third countries — 60 designations in total. The 47 EU projects span 13 Member States and 14 strategic raw materials, with an expected EUR 22.5bn capital-investment envelope; the 13 third-country projects require a further EUR 5.5bn. Designation triggers fast-track permitting (max 27 months for extraction, 15 months for processing/recycling), preferential access to EU/EIB/EBRD finance, and Member State priority status, operationalising the CRMA's 2030 benchmarks (≥10% extraction, ≥40% processing, ≥25% recycling, ≤65% single-country dependence).

Indonesia's House of Representatives (DPR) passed the Fourth Amendment to Law No. 4 of 2009 on Mineral and Coal Mining on 18 February 2025, and the government enacted it as Undang-Undang Nomor 2 Tahun 2025 on 19 March 2025. The amendment statutorily entrenches the long-standing hilirisasi (downstream-utilisation priority) doctrine for IUP/IUPK holders at production stage, opens preferential mining-permit allocation pathways for SMEs, cooperatives, religious-organisation business entities, and BUMN/BUMD, and ties licence issuance to approved RKAB production quotas — operationalising the Bahlil/Prabowo supply-management strategy across nickel, bauxite, copper, cobalt, manganese, tin, and zinc.

New Zealand's Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), under Resources Minister Hon Shane Jones, launched the country's first national Minerals Strategy and first Critical Minerals List on 31 January 2025 at OceanaGold's Waihi gold mining operation in Hauraki. The Critical Minerals List identifies 37 minerals essential to New Zealand's economy, national security, and technology needs — including gold and metallurgical coal added in the final version (up from 35 minerals in the September 2024 draft consultation). The Minerals Strategy sets a target of doubling New Zealand mineral exports from approximately NZD 1.2 billion/year to NZD 3 billion by 2035, supported by a Wood Mackenzie advisory assessment (December 2024) that identified 21 of the 37 listed minerals as domestically produced or having domestic production potential.

On 29 January 2025 the Union Cabinet of India approved the National Critical Mineral Mission (NCMM), a seven-year programme running FY2024-25 through FY2030-31 with a headline financial envelope of ₹34,300 crore (≈USD 4.0 bn). The structure is split: ₹16,300 crore of direct government outlay administered by the Ministry of Mines, plus an expected ₹18,000 crore of investment by central public-sector undertakings (PSUs) and other stakeholders. The mission was first announced by the Finance Minister in the Union Budget 2024-25 (23 July 2024) and the Cabinet approval gave it formal sanction. The NCMM covers the full critical-minerals value chain: domestic exploration, mining, beneficiation, processing, recycling from end-of-life products, and acquisition of overseas mineral assets. The Geological Survey of India (GSI) is tasked with executing 1,200 exploration projects over the seven-year window (vs. 368 projects over the prior three years), expanded to offshore polymetallic-nodule provinces containing cobalt, REE, nickel and manganese. More than 100 critical-mineral blocks are slated for auction. Khanij Bidesh India Ltd (KABIL) — the JV of NALCO, HCL and MECL — is the designated vehicle for overseas acquisitions, with active Argentina lithium (CAMYEN SE, 15,703 ha) and Australia lithium/cobalt off-take pipelines. India's official critical-minerals list contains 30 commodities, of which 24 are inscribed in Part D of Schedule I of the MMDR Act 1957 (after the 2023 amendment), reserving central-government auction authority over them. The NCMM sets an explicit recycling target of 15-20% of domestic critical-mineral demand met from secondary sources (e-waste, battery scrap, industrial waste) by 2035. The mission also funds a National Centre of Excellence for Critical Minerals and offers customs-duty waivers on 25 critical minerals (announced in the same FY24-25 budget) to lower import costs while domestic capacity scales. NCMM is India's pull-side complement to the US IRA, EU Critical Raw Materials Act, Canada Critical Minerals Strategy and Australia Critical Minerals Strategy — a coordinated allied response to Chinese dominance over refined cobalt, REE, graphite and gallium/germanium. For India specifically it is framed as the supply-chain underpinning for FAME-III (EV adoption), the Semicon India programme (gallium/germanium/silicon), and the National Solar Mission (silicon, indium, tellurium, gallium for thin-film PV).

The Minerals Regulation Commission Act, No. 14 of 2024 repeals and replaces Zambia's 2015 Mines and Minerals Development Act in its entirety, establishing a new autonomous Minerals Regulation Commission (MRC) as the country's central mining-sector regulator together with a standalone Mining Appeals Tribunal. The Act restructures licensing, royalty administration, monitoring and enforcement, and creates a dedicated dispute-resolution architecture separating regulatory and adjudicatory functions. Assented to on 20 December 2024 and gazetted on 26 December 2024, the Act took effect on 13 June 2025 pursuant to the Minerals Regulation Commission Act, 2024 (Commencement) Order, 2025 (SI 42 of 2025) signed by the Minister of Mines and Minerals Development on 3 June 2025.

Loi n°016-2024/ALT was unanimously adopted by Burkina Faso's Assemblée Législative de Transition on 18 July 2024 and promulgated on 31 July 2024 under the Traoré military-transition government. The 309-article statute replaces Loi n°036-2015/CNT (26 July 2015) and its amendment Loi n°012-2023/ALT (25 July 2023), and is the central legal vehicle for the junta's resource-nationalism agenda. Headline structural changes raise the state's free-carried interest in any new mining venture from 10% to 15% (Article 66) and grant an additional ~30% paid-participation right that may be exercised by the state or a state-mandated investor; mineral processing and sales — notably gold — now require prior administrative authorization; domestic-investor capital-opening, local content, and overproduction penalties are strengthened. Four implementing decrees (mining-title procedures, mining taxes/royalties, sector-approval conditions, capital opening to national investors) were under validation as of October 2024 and are required for full effect.

Act No. 9 of 2025, given Royal Assent on 14 February 2025, enacts the two production tax credits announced in the May 2024 Future Made in Australia package. Schedule 1 creates the Hydrogen Production Tax Incentive (HPTI): A$2/kg refundable tax offset for eligible renewable hydrogen produced with emissions intensity below 0.6 kgCO2e/kg H2. Schedule 2 creates the Critical Minerals Production Tax Incentive (CMPTI): a refundable 10% tax offset on eligible processing and refining expenditure for the 31 minerals on Australia's Critical Minerals List. Both offsets apply to production occurring between 1 July 2027 and 30 June 2040, capped at 10 years per project, administered by the ATO via new Divisions 419 (CMPTI) and 421 (HPTI) of the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997.

Mongolia's State Great Khural adopted the Sovereign Wealth Fund Law and accompanying Minerals Law amendments on 19 April 2024 (effective 10 May 2024). The package caps any private holder plus affiliates at ≤34% of issued shares of a company holding a strategic-deposit licence, and requires transfer of a state share (up to 34%) for designated strategic deposits. Up to 16 deposits are potentially affected. A February 2025 cabinet decision rebranded the SOE "Mongolrostsvetmet" as "Erdenes Critical Minerals" with an expanded rare-earth mandate, consolidating critical-minerals exploration and processing under Erdenes Mongol LLC.

Loi n° 2023-041 of 29 August 2023 establishes Mali's mandatory local-content framework for the mining sector, requiring titulaires de permis miniers and their sub-contractors to prioritise Malian nationals, local communities, national enterprises, and locally produced goods and services in the procurement and execution of all mining activities. The law mandates three-year renewable procurement plans with cascading preference from Malian citizens to ECOWAS citizens to others, and imposes capacity-building, training, and technology-transfer obligations on licence-holders. It is the procurement-side companion statute to the simultaneously adopted Code Minier (Loi 2023-040), operating under its own implementing decree Décret 2024-0397/PT-RM (July 2024).

France's first dedicated critical-minerals industrial-finance instrument: a €500m state contribution to a critical metals and rare materials investment fund, jointly announced by the Ministry of the Economy and the Ministry of Ecological Transition on 11 May 2023, targeting €2bn total fundraising including private capital. Managed by InfraVia Capital Partners with Caisse des Dépôts as state operator, the fund invests as minority partner across extraction, processing and recycling — in France, Europe and globally — prioritising off-take agreements for French and European industry. The fund operationalises the Stratégie Nationale Métaux Critiques framework (Varin Report delivered 10 January 2022) alongside the OFREMI critical-minerals observatory at BRGM and the inter-ministerial delegate for strategic-metals supply security.

Loi n° 2014-138, adopted by the Assemblée nationale and promulgated by President Alassane Ouattara on 24 March 2014, is the foundational mining-rights statute governing all mineral prospecting, research, and exploitation in Côte d'Ivoire. Its 197 articles across 16 titles repeal the prior Loi n° 95-553 (1995 Code Minier) and establish the modern permit regime, a 10% state free-carry in all industrial mining projects via SODEMI, and the royalty + ad valorem fiscal architecture that underpins every subsequent mining-convention and fiscal-law amendment. As West Africa's second-largest gold producer (approx. 45 t/yr) with growing bauxite and manganese exploration, CI's mining-code architecture is a material determinant of supply-chain access for Western and Chinese industrial consumers of these commodities.

The Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act, Act 28 of 2002, assented to by President Thabo Mbeki on 3 October 2002 and commenced on 1 May 2004 (Proclamation R.25 of 2004), is the foundational post-apartheid statute governing all mineral and petroleum resources in South Africa. The Act vests custodianship of all SA mineral and petroleum resources in the State for the benefit of all South Africans, abolishes the old-order private-ownership system of mineral rights, and establishes the Mineral and Petroleum Titles Registration Office (MPTRO). It creates the licensing regime for prospecting, mining, exploration, and production rights as limited real rights tied to land under Chapters 3–6, and embeds the Mining Charter BEE-ownership transformation framework via Section 100(2) — subsequently litigated in Chamber of Mines v Minister of Mineral Resources [2018] (SCA). The MPRDA is the parent authority for all subsequent SA mining-sector regulation including the 2008 Royalty Act, the 2018 Mining Charter III, and the 2025 Mineral Resources Development Bill currently pending before Parliament.

The Defense Production Act of 1950 (Pub. L. 81-774, 64 Stat. 798, codified at 50 U.S.C. §§4501–4568) is the foundational US statute governing wartime and emergency industrial mobilization. Signed by President Truman on 8 September 1950 during the Korean War, the Act empowers the President to compel industrial priority-rated ordering (Title I / DPAS), authorize direct investment in domestic production capacity for critical industries (Title III), and conduct investment security review (Title VII, precursor to CFIUS). Reauthorized approximately 50 times, most recently extended through September 2025 by Pub. L. 115-263 (2018) and further extended under NDAA FY2026; it has been invoked by every Administration since 1950 and has accelerated dramatically since 2020 to target critical-minerals processing, semiconductor manufacturing, battery supply chains, biopharmaceuticals, and energy infrastructure.