Federal Economy Minister Katherina Reiche wants to use government raw materials funds to support projects in Germany, Canada and Australia, among others. This is intended to reduce the German economy’s dependence on raw materials China reduced.
Rich said that Picturenewspaper, the fund should initially invest 50 million euros and a total of up to 150 million euros in lithium extraction in the Upper Rhine Graben this year. Private investors provided an additional 1.9 billion euros for this. Another project is copper-gold mining Canada with up to 150 million euros. The project has a total volume of more than 500 million euros. The fund will also contribute up to 100 million euros to the promotion of rare earths in Australia. “We are facing a difficult situation with China and making our own investments,” said the CDU politician.
The Ministry of Economy previously stated that the funds were intended to help diversify the supply of raw materials and thereby strengthen security of supplies and supply chains. The aim is to immediately increase the supply of raw materials through the federal government’s early involvement in certain projects and allowing companies in Germany to access them. In total, KfW’s development bank participation is expected to amount to around one billion euros in the period 2025 to 2028.
Spahn announced “regular China checks” for the German economy
Union faction leader Jens Spahn (CDU) also announced “regular China checks” to better “manage” Germany’s dependence on the People’s Republic of China. He said that Handelsblattit is the “main task” of the black-red coalition to “achieve more economic sovereignty”. According to plans announced on Saturday, the European Union and the SPD want to pass a motion in their parliamentary groups on Tuesday to set up a commission to review security-relevant economic relations between Germany and China.
According to information, this commission is supposed to report risks annually and decide on actions that “reduce risks”. Spahn told the newspaper that the dependency would first be analyzed with experts and then countermeasures would be taken “if necessary”. According to the agenda, the parliamentary group’s proposal will be discussed in the Bundestag on Friday.
