About the Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve
The Critical Minerals Strategic Reserve (CMSR) will secure the supply of select critical minerals for Australia and our key international partners.
Critical minerals and rare earths are vital inputs to the modern and future economy. They underpin the energy transition, high tech manufacturing, AI, digital and defence technologies.
The CMSR will support strategically important critical minerals projects where private finance is not available due to volatile markets. This will help:
- address supply chain vulnerabilities
- mitigate against market distortions
- build a sustainable domestic industry.
With other measures for critical minerals, the CMSR aims to reinforce Australia’s position as a reliable and stable supplier.
How the CMSR will work
The Minister for Resources will lead the CMSR and our department will lead delivery. New legislation will expand the powers of Export Finance Australia so it can use new financial tools to support the CMSR’s financial and commercial functions.
The CMSR will draw $1 billion in funding from the expanded $5 billion Critical Minerals Facility. The Australian Government has allocated a further $150 million for selective stockpiling of minerals, where required.
The CMSR will work by securing rights to an initial subset of critical minerals produced in Australia and on-selling those rights to meet demand.
Financial solutions and tools
The CMSR’s financial tools will secure, sell and selectively stockpile critical minerals. These could include:
- offtake agreements with fixed or floating prices
- trading in forward offtake contracts
- intermediary demand and supply aggregation
- physical stockpiling
- contracts-for-difference (price floors and ceilings).
Support will depend on the needs and conditions of specific mineral markets. This will allow Australia to respond to fast-moving market dynamics and the unique circumstances of different minerals.
Minerals in focus
The CMSR will initially focus on securing a small subset of critical minerals.
We considered the minerals on Australia’s Critical Minerals List based on:
- Suitability: critical minerals with vulnerable supply chains where Australia has the strongest potential to meet demand.
- Priority: critical minerals most important for Australia’s national security and economic resilience.
- Potential: existing Australian projects in the pipeline that could meet identified needs.
Critical minerals subset
| Critical mineral | Uses |
| Antimony |
|
| Gallium |
|
| Light rare earth elements (LREEs) particularly neodymium and praseodymium |
|
| Heavy rare earth elements (HREEs) particularly dysprosium and terbium |
|
International partnerships
The CMSR will support Australia’s collaboration with international partners to diversify critical minerals supply chains. This includes:
- Canada
- Europe
- Japan
- Republic of Korea
- United Kingdom
- United States.