Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2663 actions· ✨ 89 recent

Resolution No. 1466 of 27 December 2022 approves, for 2023, the volume of export quotas for licensed goods (Annex 1), the controlled ozone-depleting substances and fluorinated gases whose export and import require a licence (Annexes 2-3), and a list of goods whose export requires a licence (Annex 5). Annex 1 sets a zero quota for hard coal and anthracite, wood fuel, natural gas of Ukrainian origin, unwrought gold and silver and precious-metal scrap, and finite quotas of 900,000 t for coking coal and 540,000 t for fuel oil. The resolution took effect on 1 January 2023 and was amended repeatedly during 2023.

Ireland published its first comprehensive national policy for mineral exploration and mining on 7 December 2022, establishing a five-year (2022–2027) regulatory framework oriented around critical raw materials supply for the circular economy and net-zero transition. The policy commits to a stable and transparent licensing regime, community participation standards, sustainable development benchmarks, and geological knowledge-building. It designates the Geoscience Regulation Office (GRO) as Ireland's single point of contact for extraction and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as SPOC for processing and recycling under the EU Critical Raw Materials Act framework.

OFAC reissued the Central African Republic Sanctions Regulations (31 CFR Part 553) in their entirety on 29 September 2022, replacing the abbreviated framework first published on 7 July 2014 under Executive Order 13667. The reissuance adds interpretive guidance, definitions, and general licenses — including provisions for humanitarian assistance, personal communications, and non-commercial personal remittances — without expanding the underlying substantive sanctions perimeter. The action is primarily a regulatory codification that provides compliance clarity for financial institutions and other US persons transacting with or near CAR.

The Uganda Mining and Minerals Act 2022, passed by Parliament on 17 February 2022 and signed into law by President Museveni on 14 October 2022, replaces the Mining Act 2003 (Cap 148) and establishes a comprehensive new legal framework for Uganda's extractive sector. The Act grants the Republic of Uganda a 15% free-carried equity interest in all large- and medium-scale mining operations, introduces Mineral Production-Sharing Agreements (MPSAs) as a new licensing instrument alongside reformed exploration, retention, and mining licences, and establishes the Uganda National Mining Company (UNMC) as the state participation vehicle. A mandatory Mineral Beneficiation framework ties export permits to local-processing thresholds, while tightened local-content rules cover procurement, employment, and services obligations, and a new ASM formalisation regime introduces traceability and Mineral Buying Centre requirements.