AYABONGA CAWE: Scramble for rare earths heralds opportunities for SA and Africa
As the global market for EVs has expanded so too have concerns over the security of supply of materials crucial to making them
As expected, when EU and Chinese trade leaders met in early June for talks the discussion centred on trade in “high tech products” between the two parties. The Paris meeting, held a few weeks ago, was called to discuss pricing commitments by Chinese electric vehicle (EV) exporters as an “alternative remedy” arising from an anti-subsidy probe initiated by Brussels. It would not have been lost on Brussels that in May China saw an 80.9% year-on-year surge in EV exports.
China exported 200,000 EV units in May (more than two fifths of all Chinese car exports), with BYD accounting for nearly 85,000 of these. Tesla exported about 23,000 units. These vehicles went not only to Europe but to other markets as well, including — on a relatively small scale — SA. New energy vehicle sales grew from just more than 300 units in 2020 to more than 15,000 by the end of last year, with plug-in hybrids accounting for 87% of total sales in 2024. This puts into context the growing supply dominance o...
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