Critical Materials Atlas
Research · Critical-mineral supply chains

Where do critical raw materials really come from?

For any material — or any country — see where it is mined, where it is refined, and the real global bilateral trade, both directions. The chokepoint a customs ledger shows is usually the refiner, not the source.

Methods & validation · reconciliation engine: comtrade-reconcile · validated vs official BACI: top-1 exporter 25/30, share error 3.5%.

Independent public-data research (USGS · BGS World Mineral Statistics · IEA · EU CRM 2023 · UN Comtrade / CEPII BACI · Eurostat) · loading…

32
critical raw materials tracked
17/32
where the top exporter is not the top miner
84%
year-over-year nowcast persistence, out-of-sample
2002–26
reconciled trade, measured to nowcast
Follow each material from where it’s mined ● to where it’s refined ● to who imports it. On the map and globe, the arrows are real trade — amber for raw ore, violet for refined product.
How to use this

Pick a material and a country to narrow the view, then switch between Table, Flow, Map and Globe. In the selectors, ⛏ marks a country that mines your material, 🏭 that it refines it, and ✓ that trade data exists for your selection. Open any material for its full profile.

trade year 2024— 2024 newest complete · 2025* nowcast · 2026** scenario
◀ 2002–2024 · measured (reconciled BACI)2025* provisional
mined refined ▸ next stage of the chain ⚠ seller isn’t the miner ⛓ shared trade code (Ga/Ge) each country keeps its own colour across a row
Read each row left to right — from where a material comes out of the ground to who ends up selling and buying it. Open any row for its full profile. ▸ how to read

The chain runs reserves → mined → refined → top exporter → top importer: what’s left in the ground (USGS, economically recoverable), who digs it up, who processes it, who sells the most, and who buys the most — the last being the most exposed. Trade figures are world bilateral trade from CEPII BACI. Every country keeps its own colour, so a colour that recurs across a row is one of that supply chain’s main players.

Three marks worth knowing:

  • ⚠ processing chokepoint — the top exporter isn’t the top miner, so a refiner or trader stands in between.
  • ⛓ shared trade code — gallium and germanium report under one code (811292) and can’t be separated; hafnium is kept separate.
  • — no distinct refining stage, or no data.

Sources: USGS · IEA · UN Comtrade / CEPII BACI (reconciled). Sort by any column; open a row for the full profile.