00:00Critical minerals, key to modern-day technology.
00:07From electric vehicles, to defense systems,
00:12and now the center of a push to wrest control of their production,
00:16away from the world's second-largest economy, China.
00:21From efforts by Japan to source them from the seabed,
00:24to Project Vault, U.S. President Donald Trump's new initiative
00:28to create a 12 billion U.S. dollar stockpile.
00:31The plan involves building up a 60-day emergency supply of critical minerals.
00:36For years, American businesses have risked running out of critical minerals
00:39during market disruptions.
00:41Today we're launching what will be known as Project Vault
00:45to ensure that American businesses and workers are never harmed by any shortage.
00:50Trump and others are responding to China's domination of the market
00:53for critical minerals.
00:55It's responsible for more than 60 percent of production
00:58and more than 90 percent of processing.
01:02That gives it significant economic and geopolitical leverage.
01:06Like last year, when Beijing announced new export controls on the minerals,
01:10seen as a response to U.S. tariffs.
01:13Then in January, China halted rare-earth exports to some Japanese firms.
01:18It was a direct retaliation for comments by Japanese Prime Minister Takeichi Sunae
01:23that Tokyo could become militarily involved if China attacked Taiwan.
01:29To reduce reliance on China, countries like Japan are finding ways to invest in their own mining projects,
01:36while some businesses are looking to wean themselves off of critical minerals.
01:41The export slowdown caused considerable chaos.
01:46In response to the situation, we worked on reducing the amount of rare-earth we use.
01:50Another pillar was to move away from using rare-earths altogether.
01:54So we've been developing motors that do not use rare-earths.
01:58Taiwan is doubling down, adding critical minerals as one of the four pillars
02:03in its plans to expand cooperation with the U.S.
02:06Taiwan's economy minister says the country will build a rare-earth production line within three years
02:12that can meet half of domestic demand.
02:14Taiwan is one of a growing number of countries looking to get on board with U.S. efforts in this area.
02:31On Tuesday, U.S. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum announced that over two dozen countries
02:36plan to join a new alliance on critical minerals trading.
02:40We have plans to announce as many as 11 more of those agreements this week coming out of the bilateral.
02:47We know that there is strong interest from another 20 countries coming behind that.
02:51And again, the concept there is that we would have tariff-free trade and exchanges amongst those countries
03:00around these critical and rare-earth minerals, again, to create a block.
03:06China's foreign ministry has not yet responded to Washington's initiatives.
03:10Looking ahead, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio is set to host an inaugural critical minerals ministerial on Wednesday.
03:17The meeting will likely provide a benchmark for how quickly and strategically countries will move,
03:23as the push to reduce reliance on Chinese minerals grows.
03:27Dolphine Chen and Lily Lamatina for Taiwan Plus.
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