AUZ - SKI - Count Down Begins. 5days, page-215

Transcript from this mornings interview with the minister from Seoul...

KIM LANDERS: You're also visiting Japan on this trip and you're promoting Australia's rare earth minerals, things like lithium, cobalt and magnesium that are used in mobile phones and electric cars, wind turbines, solar panels and the like. China has the lion's share of this market. How quickly can Australia eat into that?

MATT CANAVAN: Well, we've got world-class reserves. We're, for example, the second largest producer of rare earths. We make 16 of the 25 different minerals that go into a mobile phone; most of your listeners have probably got one close to them right now.So, we've got a unique opportunity to contribute.

We also have some projects that are well advanced, and I spoke yesterday to some battery manufacturers here in Seoul about opportunities in Queensland and Western Australia for nickel cobalt and lithium production, all essential contributions to the manufacture of a battery.

And of course, you've seen the United States this week, the Prime Minister to have discussions with the United States about supply of critical minerals. So, we have released a strategy on this early this year. We were looking at investing in the infrastructure, the innovation required, and really the next step now is to attract that investment from key partners like here in Asia and the United States.

Taken at face value the last paragraph sounds like a decision was made earlier in the year at least superficially and now trying to attract key investment partners, I reckon I’ve got an idea of who some of those Asian ones could be....