Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2662 actions· ✨ 89 recent

On 26 February 2026 USTR published a Federal Register notice (90 FR 9686, docket USTR-2026-0034) inviting public comment on the design of a plurilateral Agreement on Trade in Critical Minerals and accompanying policy actions to strengthen critical-mineral supply-chain resilience. The notice signals that the agreement under consideration would include "a commitment by all parties to implement minimum prices or other price mechanisms, with appropriate border measures" — a coordinated price-floor/border-adjustment regime across like-minded partners to incentivise ex-China mining, processing, and refining investment. Comments were due 19 March 2026.

On 6 February 2026 Brazil's Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MCTI) and the federal innovation-financing agency FINEP (Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos) launched Round 2 of the "Mais Inovação Brasil" call for the defence sector, committing BRL 300 million (~USD 56.9 million) in non-reimbursable economic-subsidy funding. Companies may apply under two thematic lines — "National Defence Technologies" or "Economic Sustainability for the Defence Industrial Base (BID)" — for projects with high technical uncertainty aligned with strategic defence priorities, in exchange for a financial counterpart proportional to the grant received. Applications are accepted on a continuous-flow basis until 30 September 2026 (later extended to 2 October 2026) or until the budget is exhausted.

On 14 January 2026 President Trump issued a Presidential Proclamation under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 titled "Adjusting Imports of Processed Critical Minerals and Their Derivative Products into the United States". Unlike the parallel 14 January 2026 semiconductor proclamation and the subsequent April 2026 pharmaceutical proclamation, the PCMDP proclamation does NOT immediately impose tariffs. Instead it directs the Secretary of Commerce and the U.S. Trade Representative to jointly negotiate bilateral and plurilateral supply agreements with trading partners, with an initial 180-day status report due 13 July 2026. The proclamation reserves residual authority to impose tariffs if negotiations fail or prove ineffective, and explicitly contemplates "price floors" on PCMDP imports as a negotiated instrument.

The MoEFCC Impact Assessment Division issued an Office Memorandum on 8 September 2025 categorically exempting all mining projects involving atomic minerals (uranium, thorium and the 12 minerals under the Atomic Energy Act 1962), the 30 critical minerals notified by the Ministry of Mines on 28 June 2023, and separately designated strategic minerals from the mandatory public-consultation stage (para 7(i)) of the EIA Notification 2006, invoking the existing national-defence and strategic-considerations clause. Exempted projects will instead undergo comprehensive appraisal by the relevant Sectoral Expert Appraisal Committee (SEAC/EAC) at the central level regardless of project size, bypassing the standard Category-A/B thresholding architecture. The measure was issued in response to formal requests from the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), and directly accelerates the approval pipeline for the National Critical Mineral Mission (Rs 34,300 crore, 2025-2031).

Parliament of India passed the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Amendment Act, 2025 (Act No. 28 of 2025) — Lok Sabha on 12 August 2025, Rajya Sabha on 19 August 2025, Presidential assent on 21 August 2025, in force 1 September 2025 — amending the parent MMDR Act, 1957. The Act removes the prior 50% cap on captive-mine production eligible for open sale (allowing captive-block holders unrestricted third-party sale after meeting end-use requirements), widens the National Mineral Exploration Trust into the National Mineral Exploration and Development Trust (NMEDT) with mandate extended to mine development, offshore areas, and overseas acquisition operations, raises the NMEDT royalty contribution from 2% to 3%, waives the auction premium for the 24 critical and strategic minerals listed in Part D of the First Schedule (including lithium, cobalt, graphite, nickel, REE, PGM, beryllium, and antimony), and establishes a statutory authority to register and regulate Mineral Exchanges as electronic commodity-trading platforms for minerals and metals.

The Aizsardzības industrijas likums (Defence Industry Law), adopted by the Saeima on 27 March 2024 and published in Latvijas Vēstnesis No. 70 on 10 April 2024, is Latvia's first standalone statute codifying state-support instruments for domestically registered defence-industrial-base firms. The law establishes a strategic-partnership agreement framework between the Ministry of Defence and Latvian-registered defence-tech manufacturers (including the Latvian drone-tech cluster — Atlas Aerospace, UAV Factory, Edge Autonomy Latvia), defines continuity-of-operations and supply-security obligations for strategic-partner firms, and provides a procurement-preference channel for Latvian-registered defence suppliers in MoD and State Defence Logistics and Procurement Centre contracting. The law also streamlines export-licence processing for qualified Latvian strategic- goods exporters and aligns state-support measures with EU Treaty Article 346 defence-exemption and EU European Defence Fund / EDIRPA co-financing rules.