Matthew Canavan (Queensland, Liberal National Party, Minister for Resources and Northern Australia) Share this | Hansard source

Before I left for the United States, I announced with Senator Birmingham further developments in our critical minerals strategy. We have committed to establish a critical minerals facilitation office. That will be up and running by 1 January next year. It will help facilitate and attract investment from around the world. We put forward some extra funding for further research, particularly on identifying the availability of rare earths or other minerals that we might not have looked at before, including in things like tailings dams. There are a lot of minerals in tailings dams that we haven't processed before. Products like cobalt, which is a by-product often of nickel production, are in great demand now for electric vehicles. So we are going to look again at what exists and what can be processed.

We also announced that we are opening Export Finance Australia for investment in critical minerals, including through partnerships and joint funding with the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility. That is to back those opportunities in Western Australia and around the country that Senator O'Sullivan asked about earlier today. Those investments will create jobs as well as help secure the minerals sector for the modern economy. (Time expired)