Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic ADVERTISEMENTWorld powers are scrambling to get ahead in the race for the minerals needed to produce new technologies such as microchips, solar panels and electric cars.\u00a0US President Donald Trump has invoked wartime powers to boost American production, and has contemplated the use of economic, military and diplomatic force to gain access to Canada, Greenland and Ukraine\u2019s mineral wealth.\u00a0China is using its near-monopoly of the minerals refining market to get the upper hand over its geopolitical rivals.\u00a0In this new battlefield among world powers, where does the European Union stand?\u00a0According to the EU executive, EU demand for some elements is set to sky-rocket over the coming decade. Its lithium needs, for example, essential to produce batteries for electric vehicles, will increase twelve-fold by 2030 and a staggering twenty-one-fold by 2050.\u202f\u00a0The EU\u2019s heavy reliance on single third countries for some materials make it vulnerable. For example, it depends on China for 100% of its heavy rare earth elements (REE), Turkey for 99% of its boron supply, and South Africa for 71% of platinum.\u202f\u00a0China has already curbed the exports of some minerals to the EU, including those critical for a range of sectors from aerospace to semiconductors.\u00a0What is the Critical Raw Materials Act?The bloc is betting on its Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA) \u2013 legislation adopted in March last year \u2013 to avoid disruptions to its mineral supply chains.\u202f\u00a0It aims to reduce vulnerabilities by exploiting more minerals on European soil, while pursuing partnerships with \u201clike-minded\u201d resource-rich partners \u2013 14 deals have already been signed, including with Serbia, Australia, Greenland, Chile and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.\u00a0The Act lists 34 materials the bloc deems \u201ccritical\u201d, of which 17 are prioritised as \u201cstrategic\u201d, including lithium, graphite, nickel, cobalt, copper, and rare earth elements.It also sets ambitious targets for the EU to extract 10%, process 40% and recycle 25% of its annual consumption of strategic raw materials by 2030.\u00a0\u201cRecycling above-the-ground raw materials, the urban mine, it is an attractive avenue for Europe,\u201d Edoardo Righetti, a researcher for think tank CEPs explained, \u201cbecause we do have relatively limited extraction capacity, extraction potential.\u201d\u00a0\u201cBut for most of these materials, recycling rates are still relatively low. We do not have enough technologies that have reached the end of life yet,\u201d he added. \u201cThere are also other more structural issues, including the cost of recycling, underdeveloped collection systems or inefficient collection systems.\u201d\u00a0The EU executive is trying to overcome barriers by reducing administrative burdens on companies, for example by providing access to finance and establishing shorter permitting timeframes of 27 months for extraction permits and 15 months for processing and recycling permits.\u00a0Could local socio-environmental concerns hold projects back?The Commission recently selected 47 so-called \u2018strategic\u2019 projects across 13 member states, the first in a broader pool of projects to mine, refine and recycle more raw materials domestically.\u00a0ADVERTISEMENTThe goal, the executive says, is to ensure a \u201csecure and sustainable\u201d supply of these critical materials by maximising Europe\u2019s own resources.\u00a0Yet, rural communities across Europe could mount challenges.\u00a0Plans to mine for lithium in Portugal have already sparked strong resistance, from both residents and environmental NGOs. They cite potential environmental damage and disruption to the lives of those living in affected communities.\u00a0The same resistance has come to the fore in Serbia, a EU candidate country, where protests erupted last summer amid plans to open Europe\u2019s largest lithium mining operation in the fertile Jadar valley, announced just weeks after the EU clinched a raw materials deal with the Serbian government.\u202f\u00a0ADVERTISEMENTIs the EU at risk of falling behind in the race?The rules of the game are also shifting, as Donald Trump takes on an increasingly aggressive approach to the mineral race.\u00a0The US President has aggressively demanded access to Ukraine\u2019s mineral wealth in return for Washington\u2019s military support, threatened to annex neighbouring, resource-rich Canada and wants to \u201cbuy\u201d Greenland to seize control of its commodities.\u00a0\u201cThe EU has a Memorandum of Understanding (on raw materials) signed with Ukraine, but at the same time the Trump administration has been pushing Ukraine to sign a deal in exchange for continued military support \u2013 or in repayment for military support to date as the White House would have it \u2013 where they want access, essentially open access to all of Ukraine’s mineral wealth and Ukraine is another of the global powerhouses of mineral resources,\u201d Robert Hodgson, Euronews\u2019 senior energy and environment reporter, explains.\u00a0He adds that similar moral conundrums arise when the EU signs similar deals with conflict-affected areas where the proceeds from mineral trade are used to finance armed groups, fuelling human rights abuses.\u00a0ADVERTISEMENT\u201cRwanda has come into focus recently because the Rwandan military has been supporting rebel groups in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd there’s been credible reports from the UN and NGOs that minerals are being smuggled across the border into Rwanda and then exported to Europe \u2013 known as conflict minerals.\u201d\u00a0The EU executive said in February its raw materials deal with Rwanda was \u201cunder review\u201d after Rwandan-backed M23 rebels seized control of eastern DRC territory, prompting international condemnation.\u00a0Watch the full episode in the video above.\u00a0Journalist: Mared Gwyn Jones\u00a0ADVERTISEMENTContent production: Pilar Montero L\u00f3pez\u00a0Video production: Zacharia Vigneron\u00a0Graphics: Loredana Dumitru\u00a0Editorial coordination: Ana L\u00e1zaro Bosch and Jeremy Fleming-JonesADVERTISEMENT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic ADVERTISEMENTWorld powers are scrambling to get ahead in the race for the minerals needed to produce new technologies such as microchips, solar panels and electric cars.\u00a0US President Donald Trump has invoked wartime powers to boost American production, and has contemplated the use of economic,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":286344,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-286343","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=286343"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":286345,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286343\/revisions\/286345"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286344"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globetimeline.com\/ar\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}