Study Shows: Mineral shortage could upset markets

MIAMI: Rare minerals are crucial to the manufacture of mobile phones, electronics and medical equipment, and a shortage could upset the global marketplace and spark wide-ranging financial instability, a study warned. The analysis of international commodity trade networks and how they could be roiled by shortages of minerals was published in the journal Science Advances. “Regional shortages of minerals necessary for the manufacture of modern technologies could ripple throughout the trade system, leading to a sharp increase in the price volatility of such minerals in the global markets,” said lead author Peter Klimek, a researcher at the Medical University of Vienna, Austria. Klimek led the study- which examined the flows of 71 mineral commodities between 107 countries -in collaboration with International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) researchers.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 15^th, 2015.

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