Global producers of wind turbines, electric cars, mobile phones and a host of other electronics goods have been nervous of late because of China’s publicized restrictions on the rare earth minerals it’s been sitting on for nearly twenty years. China essentially cornered the market on rare earth minerals through cutting corners on health and safety issues in the 1990s, and the rest of the world blithely followed along. Now, with China itself a major user of these metals, the domestic industry wants to make sure its got a lock on its own precious supply. China now consumes over 60 per cent of the world’s rare earth metals, up from just over 30 per cent in 2001, and exports the rest, according to the Dragonbeat blog.

Dragonbeat makes the point that the downturn in the global economy has meant that stockpiles of rare metals have not been touched. So, though there may be a speculative spike in the near term, countries have enough of the stuff to get through China’s stinginess until old mines in the States and Australia are brought back online, and new deposits exploited, which should be around 2012.

So, though there may be enough of the stuff over the next five years, an enlarged middle class in China and India, and the increased use of miniaturized, “leap-frog” technologies in Africa, Bangladesh, and rural India – like mobile phones and net books – will still mean increasing demand on rare earth inventories. So, though China may not corner the market, the stuff will become rarer – and dearer – still.