NITI Aayog’s Arvind Virmani requires a double method on uncommon earth minerals|Image: ANI
India should embrace a double method on uncommon earth minerals, focusing both on domestic mineral sourcing and worldwide cooperation for processing and production of metals to stem reliance on China, the world’s biggest provider, NITI Aayog Member Arvind Virmani stated on Thursday.”The whole world is highly dependent because they control 80 to 90 per cent of the metals, the rare earth metals actually,” Virmani informed ANI in an unique interview. “So, really there is a dual issue. One is of rare earth minerals and then translating those minerals into metals. So those have to be addressed separately or by different strategies.”
While India has some rare-earth reserves, it will require to work together with other resource-rich countries to construct a durable supply chain, he stated.
“In the case of minerals, we also have certain rare earth minerals, but we can also combine with other countries like Brazil, et cetera, which have different minerals, South Africa or other African countries, even Russia,” he even more informed ANI.
The more challenging and difficult part is actually to transform those into metals, he stated, including that for this, cooperation is really crucial.
He stated that the refining and metal processing phases are both technically difficult and ecologically delicate, needing more powerful federal government participation and worldwide collaborations.
Virmani stated, “One is that the processing is very polluting. So, the government has to play a much bigger role by helping them reduce pollution. The companies cannot do it by themselves, and especially so quickly.”
He stated the 2nd crucial element is worldwide cooperation to produce economies of scale for research study and production of unusual earth metals.
“And the second is international cooperation. Again, you need scale. If you’re going to invest a lot in a new R&D, the more your potential demand, the more that R&D can spread over,” he included. An ensured need in a global cooperative structure can likewise assist speed up the advancement of alternative sources of uncommon earth metals, he included.
Virmani’s remarks come in the middle of growing worldwide efforts to diversify supply chains far from China and protected access to important minerals required for tidy energy innovations, electronic devices, and defence production.
He stated that India’s double technique of domestic mineral expedition integrated with global cooperation for processing would help in reducing vulnerability and promote commercial self-reliance. The NITI Aayog member likewise discussed worldwide financial volatility, trade settlements, and India’s development projection, stating that the “huge uncertainty in 2025 has made everybody uncertain, including those who are forecasting.”
“Personally, I’ve had a forecast which I have not changed,” Virmani stated. “From the beginning of the year, my forecast was 6.5 per cent plus minus 0.5 and basically the events which have happened. I would say at this point that my focus has an upward bias.” He included that regardless of trade unpredictabilities, policy reforms such as the Goods and Services Tax (GST) are having a favorable result on personal financial investment.
“GST definitely has a positive impact on private investment and to the extent there was some negative effect of the tariffs, I think it will largely be overcome by this,” he stated. Virmani likewise described India’s continuous bilateral trade settlements, calling them part of a moving international dynamic.
“The imposition of tariffs then changed it into a non-cooperative game,” he stated. “And now the recent developments have moved it back to a cooperative game, one would expect a bilateral trade agreement to be signed at some point.”
He stated that such arrangements would be “mutually beneficial” and would support “positive effects on both Indian growth and American growth.”
On the production front, Virmani explained that India requires to diversify imports, determine alternative sources, and promote joint endeavors to lower reliance on Chinese supply chains.
“People have got so used to importing from China that they fail to identify alternative sources,” he stated. “Import substitution is possible, and we find that one big chunk of it, like machinery, for example, has segmented markets. China has cheaper but lower quality machines, but higher quality ones are available in Germany, Japan, and Taiwan.”
He stated motivating these nations to perform labour-intensive parts of their production in India might decrease expenses and reinforce India’s production base. “That is the third approach to encourage these countries to do some labour-intensive parts of their process in India, kind of a JV or joint production,” he described.
Virmani concluded that the diversity of supply chains, especially in sectors such as mobile production, is currently yielding outcomes and will assist India both minimize imports and broaden exports.
“Once the demand is shifted by a company which has supply chains in China, then the supply chain and backward integration take place,” he stated. “That will help in reducing imports from China as well as contributing to exports.”