Thinking About China
Opinion

G7 Commits to End China’s Monopoly on Rare Earths

The large economies of the G7 have decided to take steps that will end China’s rare-earth monopoly, but their efforts will take time.
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G7 Commits to End China’s Monopoly on Rare Earths
A container of europium oxide imported from China sits in the storage room of Tradium, a rare-earths trading firm, in Frankfurt, Germany, on Nov. 4, 2025. Decades of market manipulation, state backing, and aggressive investment have made China the world’s dominant supplier of rare-earth elements. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP via Getty Images
Milton Ezrati
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Commentary

Beijing has threatened to stop the flow of rare-earth elements so many times in just the last few months that all the world’s major economies have decided to join the United States and have jointly committed themselves to developing other, non-Chinese sources of these crucial minerals.

Milton Ezrati
Milton Ezrati
Author
Milton Ezrati is a contributing editor at The National Interest, an affiliate of the Center for the Study of Human Capital at the University at Buffalo (SUNY), and chief economist for Vested, a New York-based communications firm. Before joining Vested, he served as chief market strategist and economist for Lord, Abbett & Co. He also writes frequently for City Journal and blogs regularly for Forbes. His latest book is “Thirty Tomorrows: The Next Three Decades of Globalization, Demographics, and How We Will Live.”