US President Donald Trump signed Wednesday an executive order for developing a federal 

strategy that ensures "secure and reliable supplies" of critical minerals. 

Inked  amid  growing  concern  about  reliance  on  imports,  the  order  aims to reduce "this 

dependency of the United States on foreign sources," for minerals such as cobalt, graphite, 

lithium and others. 

The executive order, in fact, was signed a day after the  US Department of the Interior and th

e US Geological Survey issued a comprehensive report showing that the US is "100% foreign

-reliant  on  20 minerals,"  and  that  "rare  earth  minerals are produced almost exclusively in 

China." The  report  identified  23 of the minerals that the Interior Department says are most-

needed  to   sustain  the  national  defense  and  economy  "and  are  used  in manufacturing 

everything from batteries and computer chips to equipment used by our military." 

According  to  the recently  released USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2017, the US was 

100%  net  import  reliant  on 20 mineral commodities in 2016, including manganese, niobium, 

tantalum and others. 

Also among the 23 minerals cited in Interior's report are antimony, beryllium, cobalt, graphite, 

lithium, platinum group elements, tin, titanium and vanadium. 

In  addition  to  China,  many  of  these minerals are sourced from Russia, South Africa, Brazil 

and Canada. 

"Despite  the  presence  of  significant  deposits of some of these minerals across the United 

States,  our  miners and producers are currently limited by a lack of comprehensive, machine-

readable  data  concerning  topographical,  geological,  and  geophysical surveys; permitting 

delays; and the potential for protracted litigation regarding permits that are issued," noted the 

executive order.