Representatives of the United States, China and Russia took part in the Forum on Mineral Resources Extraction organized in Saudi Arabia. Washington and Moscow have both signed separate agreements with Riyadh on mining principles.
This week’s meeting in Riyadh attracted 16,000 participants, while in 2021 only 4,700 attended the first Future Minerals Forum.
The goal of the Saudi authorities is to diversify its economic model and reduce the dependence of the Treasury’s revenues on the export of oil and its products. The extraction of mineral resources has been chosen as the new direction of the country’s development strategy, reports the Wall Street Journal.
In total, the kingdom’s authorities hope to conclude mining deals worth 75 billion Saudi riyals, or 18 billion euros, during the three-day event.
Saudi Arabia’s government estimates its mineral resources are worth $2.5 trillion, up from the 2016 estimate of $1.3 trillion. Extensive deposits of copper, zinc, gold, earth metals and phosphates have been identified in the country, but a significant portion of the country’s territory remains unexplored, so the actual value of Saudi Arabia’s mineral resources could be significantly higher.
Saudi Arabia has recently improved relations with the United States, but has also developed ties with China and Russia.
“We are at the center of the world. Saudi Arabia is between three continents. We think of uniting the whole world,” Khalid al-Mudaifer, Saudi Arabia’s deputy mining minister, told the forum.
But Saudi Arabia’s goal is not just to extract its own minerals. At a forum held a year ago, Riyadh’s rulers announced that its sovereign wealth fund and state mining company had created a subsidiary, Manara Minerals, to invest in foreign mining projects.
In July the company concluded the first deal that immediately attracted the attention of investors: Manara bought a 10% stake in Brazilian mining company Vale for $2.6 billion. The Saudi government plans to invest more than $15 billion in foreign mining projects in the coming years, writes the Wall Street Journal.
For example, authorities in Riyadh are discussing investing in Pakistan’s Reko Dig project, which promises to be one of the world’s largest copper mines.
The presence of representatives of the American government at the forum is a sign of the improvement of relations between the two countries, which had sharply deteriorated in 2018 after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Arabian embassy in Turkey.
Washington is trying to reduce its dependence on minerals mined in China and diversify its supply chains. Saudi Arabia can play an important role in this plan.
“This is not a geopolitical confrontation. We must invest with our allies and friends to ensure that the global conflict [maavarade tarneahelate] the system is well equipped and well diversified,” said Amos Hochstein, a senior White House adviser who attended the forum.
However, Chinese and Russian companies and representatives of the Russian government also attended the meeting and signed agreements with Saudi Arabian companies.
2024-01-12 06:29:00
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