Mineral-rich African states to explore new markets after EU changes its buying rules

ea drc

Congolese men work at a processing plant during a maintenance day on December 1, 2011. PHOTO | AFP

The European Union, the world’s largest single market, has introduced new measures to reduce their “dependency” on mineral imports from outside the bloc.

The European Council adopted the Critical Raw Materials Act on June 30, a regulation that seeks to utilise the bloc’s Common Market and partnerships to “diversify critical raw material supply chains, which currently rely on imports from a handful of third countries.”