25 June 2026 · University of Sussex, UK Closing
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Critical minerals and Critical Raw Materials are central to economic development, national security, and strategic competition. Securing supply chain resilience has become a top policy priority worldwide. For the United States, CRMs are vital in maintaining its military and defenceedge as well as advanced manufacturing industries.
For the UK and the European Union, where domestic mining is limited, stable access to CRMs from third countries will determine their future role in global climate, industrial, and technological leadership. Their transition to digital economies, for instance, depends on reliable access to minerals and the ability to participate in emerging manufacturing supply chains. For China, they serve as indispensable inputs for downstream industries and have been integral to its industrial transformation. For many developing economies holding key reserves, CRMs are crucial both as export commodities and as entry points into global value chains.
The rising mineral demand has been framed as a renewed opportunity for industrialisation and development. CRMs are thus now a cornerstone of economic security and strategic power for both producers and consumers. Yet their expansion is generating two major sources of tension—between countries and within countries.
This pillar explores how mining can support industrialisation and structural transformation in mineral-producing countries. We examine:
• How to build linkages between mining and broader productive sectors such as manufacturing, services and green industries.
• Ways to acquire technological know-how, strengthen domestic capabilities and move up the value chain.
• Industrial policy tools suited to today’s critical minerals boom, including local-content measures, midstream processing incentives and innovation policies.
• Strategies to mitigate inequality and distribute the gains from mineral wealth more fairly across regions and social groups. Through collaborative work with governments, development finance institutions, firms and communities, the Lab co-designs, tests and refines practical policy instruments that can turn mineral wealth into durable productive capacities.
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Within this landscape, “Global China” has become a central force in critical minerals and manufacturing supply chains. China and the developing world hold significant reserves, while Chinese firms lead in refining, separation and processing. This pillar focuses on the geopolitics and political economy of international cooperation in the CRM sector. We analyse:
• The proliferation of standards-setting efforts, minerals partnerships and bilateral agreements • How Global China is reshaping supply chains and re-writing trade, finance and investment relations with the Global South
• How producer countries use cartels, export measures and price coordination to strengthen their bargaining power
• The potential for new cooperation frameworks including BRICS and other developing-country initiatives
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Conflicts around mining are becoming more frequent, organised and politically salient. Existing governance frameworks often fail to protect people and nature, generate broad-based value or include affected communities in decision-making. This pillar is about rebuilding territorial legitimacy around mining. We work to:
• Understand why conflicts arise and how they relate to inequality, exclusion and environmental harm • Identify institutional gaps and failures that allow unsustainable practices
• Co-design participatory practices and institutional innovations including FPIC processes, benefit-sharing mechanisms
• Test regulatory tools that link access to finance to social and environmental performance
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25 June 2026 · University of Sussex, UK Closing
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25 June 2026 · University of Sussex, UK The work
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25–26 June 2026 · University of Sussex, UK Industrial p
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Dr. Jewellord Nem Singh, led a workshop at University o
Read MoreDr Jewellord (Jojo) Nem Singh is a Principal Research Fellow in Global Political Economy at the School of Global Studies, University of Sussex, and Lead Convenor of the Critical Minerals Policy Lab. He is Principal Investigator of the European Research Council Starting Grant GRIP-ARM (Green Industrial Policy in the Age of Rare Metals), a trans-regional comparison of growth strategies in rare earths mining. His research sits at the intersection of industrial policy, resource governance and the geopolitics of critical raw materials, with a focus on how developing countries can turn mineral wealth into industrial capability and developmental agency. He is the author of Business of the State: Why State Ownership Matters for Resource Governance (Oxford University Press, 2024) and co-editor of the Handbook of Resource Nationalism (Edward Elgar, 2026).
Read MoreDr Anabel Marín is a Research Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), where she leads the Business, Markets and State Cluster, and a researcher at CONICET, Argentina (on leave). An economist by training, with a PhD in Science and Technology Policy Studies from SPRU, University of Sussex, her work examines how resource-rich countries can turn mining and other natural-resource industries into engines of innovation, industrial development and fairer, more democratic governance. She leads research on critical minerals and sustainable development, lithium value chains, the justice footprint of mineral supply chains, and the role of civic power in shaping just energy transitions, and has advised UNCTAD, ECLAC, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the Asian Development Bank and other international organisations. She is co-editor of the Environmental Research Letters focus collection on the social and environmental aspects of extracting energy-transition minerals.
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Nem Singh (Jojo) is a Principal Research Fellow in Global Political Economy at the University of Sussex, UK, and Lead Convenor of the Critical Minerals Policy Lab. He serves as Principal Investigator of the ERC-funded GRIP-ARM project on green industrial policy and rare metals. His expertise spans global political economy, resource nationalism, and industrial policy in developing countries.
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Dr Anabel Marín is a Research Fellow and Leader of the Business, Markets and State Cluster at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS). Her research examines how mineral-rich countries can turn extraction into innovation, industrial development and fairer governance, with recent work on lithium value chains, civic power in mining conflicts, and critical minerals partnerships.
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Dr Yingfeng Ji is a Research Fellow and Postdoctoral Researcher on the ERC-funded GRIP-ARM project at the University of Sussex. She holds a PhD and an MPhil in Development Studies from the University of Cambridge. Her research covers green industrial policy, China's overseas supply chains, and the political economy of critical minerals, with fieldwork in Central Asia.
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Arnie Cordero Trinidad is a Research Fellow at the University of Sussex and an Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of the Philippines Diliman. He holds a PhD in Sociology from Trinity College Dublin. His work on development, migration, class, and disaster risk reduction has been published in European Societies, Sociology, and the International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction.
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Joanna Morley is a Fellow of the Critical Minerals Policy Lab and holds a PhD in Latin American Studies from the University of Liverpool (ESRC-funded). Her research focuses on the political economy of energy transitions, large-scale infrastructure projects, and contested natural resource governance in extractive industries.
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