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

On 19 June 2026, President Mamadi Doumbouya chaired a strategic meeting in Conakry with industrial, semi-industrial and artisanal gold operators and gold-buying counters, announcing that "l'exportation de l'or brut appartient désormais au passé" — a formal and permanent prohibition on exporting unrefined gold mined in Guinea. All gold must henceforth be refined domestically, primarily via the state-backed Nimba Gold Refinery (Gbessia, Conakry), before any international sale. Operators who continue exporting raw gold risk suspension or revocation of their operating licence and mining convention. The measure extends Guinea's Simandou 2040 local-transformation doctrine — already applied to bauxite and iron ore — to the gold sector for the first time.

On 25 February 2026 Zimbabwe's Ministry of Mines and Mining Development, under Minister Polite Kambamura, announced an immediate and indefinite suspension of exports of all unprocessed minerals — including lithium-bearing spodumene concentrates, which had previously been exempt from the country's December 2022 ban on raw lithium ore (Statutory Instrument 213 of 2022). The directive was communicated by ministerial letter dated 17 February 2026 to the Chamber of Mines of Zimbabwe and copied to lithium producers; the suspension took effect on 25 February and explicitly covered consignments already in transit, with the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) and the Minerals Marketing Corporation of Zimbabwe (MMCZ) ordered to halt clearance at the border. The measure brings forward by roughly eleven months a lithium-concentrate export ban that had been telegraphed for January 2027, and broadens it to all raw mineral exports. The Minister cited "national interest", in-country beneficiation, transparency, and prevention of mineral export "leakages" (smuggling and under-invoicing) as the rationale. Bloomberg and Reuters reporting noted under-declaration of grade and value as a proximate trigger; the government later (April 2026) clarified that reinstated exports would require Quota Verification certificates, monthly reporting, on-site assay laboratories, and individual producer-level export ceilings — i.e. the suspension functions as a reset to a quota regime rather than a permanent embargo. Zimbabwe is the world's fifth-largest lithium producer (~6-7% of global supply on a contained-LCE basis) and exported 1.128 million tonnes of spodumene concentrate in 2025 (an 11% YoY increase). The producer base is overwhelmingly Chinese-owned: Zhejiang Huayou Cobalt (Arcadia / Prospect), Sinomine Resource Group (Bikita Minerals), Chengxin Lithium (Sabi Star), and Sichuan Yahua (Kamativi) together account for the majority of output. The ban therefore primarily disrupts Chinese midstream lithium converters in Sichuan and Jiangxi that depend on Zimbabwean spodumene feedstock, while incrementally tightening the global seaborne concentrate market. The action is structurally a continuation of the EM resource-nationalism / upstream-capture template pioneered by Indonesia's nickel-ore ban (2020) and most recently extended by the DRC's ARECOMS cobalt suspension and quota system (Feb-Oct 2025). It reinforces a pattern in which producing-country governments capture processing margin from consuming-country smelters, and it does so in a commodity (lithium) where ex-China refining capacity is still thin, magnifying near-term price impact even though the headline share of global supply removed is moderate.

On October 31, 2025, Bulgaria's National Assembly voted 135-4 (42 abstentions) to adopt a decision introducing a temporary measure restricting the export and intra-EU supply of petroleum products — chiefly diesel and aviation fuel — to all destinations, including fellow EU member states. The measure took effect around November 1, 2025 upon publication. Gasoline was excluded because domestic production exceeds internal demand. The ban is a direct domestic-supply-security response to US OFAC's October 22, 2025 SDN designation of Lukoil (see responds_to), whose Burgas refinery supplies roughly 80% of Bulgaria's fuel market; lawmakers cited the risk that sanctions exposure could disrupt Lukoil's export activity and drain the volumes needed to cover domestic demand. Exemptions cover refuelling of ships and aircraft and deliveries to NATO and EU member-state armed forces under the common defence policy.

Russia's government imposed a temporary ban on exports of diesel fuel, marine (bunker) fuel and other gas oils (EAEU HS codes 2710 19 421 0 - 2710 19 429 0), including volumes purchased on exchange trading, effective 1 October 2025. The measure was framed as a domestic fuel-market stabilisation tool and initially exempted direct refinery producers from the ban. Russia is one of the world's largest diesel/gasoil exporters, so a full-coverage export halt on these grades has global gasoil-market significance, not just a regional effect. The ban has since been extended and tightened four times through mid-2026 (see amendments).

Indonesia's Ministry of Trade promulgated Peraturan Menteri Perdagangan (Permendag) No. 10 of 2024 on 30 May 2024, amending Permendag 22/2023 on Goods Prohibited for Export. The regulation set 31 December 2024 as the final cutoff for copper-concentrate and anode-sludge exports — extending the original 1 June 2024 ban deadline by seven months — and enforced a full prohibition starting 1 January 2025. The measure is paired with ESDM Regulation No. 6 of 2024 covering the upstream mining-product side, completing the legal architecture of Indonesia's copper "hilirisasi" (downstream-isation) mandate. The ban forces all domestically mined copper concentrate to be smelted and refined inside Indonesia. Two operators are directly affected: PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), majority-owned by state holding MIND ID with Freeport-McMoRan as minority partner, which operates the Grasberg mine in Papua and the new Manyar/Gresik smelter in JIIPE; and PT Amman Mineral Nusa Tenggara (subsidiary of PT Amman Mineral Internasional, IDX:AMMN), which operates the Batu Hijau mine in Sumbawa with a smelter under commissioning. A fire at Freeport's Gresik smelter in October 2024 disrupted ramp-up and forced the government to grant a discretionary export-permit extension into 2025 for PTFI, signalling that the ban — while now legally in force — is being enforced flexibly during smelter commissioning rather than as a hard stop. Permendag 10/2024 is the copper-sector equivalent of the 2020 nickel- ore export ban (ESDM 11/2019) and the planned bauxite-ore ban (effective June 2023). Together these three measures complete Indonesia's resource-nationalism package across its three highest-value mineral exports: nickel, bauxite, and copper. Combined domestic smelter capex commitments tied to the copper rule (Freeport Manyar + Amman Sumbawa) total ~USD 6 billion. Indonesia's Finance Ministry estimated forgone export revenue of ~Rp 10 trillion (~USD 640 million per year) from the copper-concentrate ban alone, which the government is treating as an acceptable downstream-policy cost. Severity is set at 4: the action is binding, durable, and reshapes a globally relevant supply chain (Indonesia is ~5% of global mined copper, rising), but discretionary export extensions during smelter commissioning soften near-term enforcement and limit the immediate market shock relative to the harder 2020 nickel rule.

Indonesia banned the export of raw bauxite ore (including washed bauxite) effective 10 June 2023, extending the "hilirisasi" (downstream-isation) doctrine that previously prohibited nickel-ore exports (effective 1 January 2020) to the country's second-largest mineral export. The ban is implemented through the existing Mining Law framework (UU 3/2020 amending UU 4/2009) and operationalised via Ministry of Trade Regulation Permendag 18/2022 on Provisions for Mining-Product Exports. President Joko Widodo formally announced the bauxite-export-ban schedule on 21 December 2022, citing forecast revenue uplift from IDR 21 trillion to IDR 62 trillion (~USD 1.35bn → ~USD 3.9bn) once domestic alumina/ aluminium refining ramps.

Effective 3 March 2022 (retroactive to five days before Federal Register publication), the US Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) expanded Russian Industry Sector Sanctions under the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) by adding a new license requirement and denial policy for oil refinery equipment destined for or within Russia. The rule creates 15 CFR § 746.5(a)(1)(ii) and a new Supplement No. 4 to Part 746 enumerating approximately 20 categories of refining equipment — from crude distillation units and catalytic crackers to hydrocracking reactors and sulphur recovery units. Applications are subject to a policy of denial, with a narrow health-and-safety exception reviewed case by case. The stated rationale is to limit Russia's ability to generate oil-derived government revenues used to finance its military operations in Ukraine.

On 25 February 2022, the day after Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Council of the European Union adopted Regulation (EU) 2022/328, amending Regulation (EU) No 833/2014. It prohibits the sale, supply, transfer or export of dual-use goods and technology to any person, entity or body in Russia, or for military use or military end-users there, and extends to goods and technology suited for use in the oil refining industry and for the aviation and space industry, alongside a ban on related technical assistance, brokering, financing and insurance/maintenance services. The Regulation entered into force on the day after its Official Journal publication (OJ L 49, 25.2.2022), i.e. 26 February 2022.