Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821

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Resources Policy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/resourpol

A comprehensive evaluation of the international competitiveness of

strategic minerals in China, Australia, Russia and India: The case of
rare earths
Qing Guo *, Wenlan You
School of Economics and Trade, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, Guangzhou, 510006, China

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Rare earths serve an irreplaceable and vital role in the development of many strategic and prospering high-tech
Rare earth resources sectors as a key raw ingredient for the creation of high-tech products. The continued rise in global demand for
Competitiveness rare earths is putting enormous pressure on the existing rare earth supply chain. The rare earth reserves of China,
TOPSIS
Australia, Russia and India are among the world’s leading countries. To systematically evaluate the competi­
Combinatorial empowerment method
Projection pursuit method
tiveness of these four countries’ rare earth industries, this paper uses the projection pursuit method and the
improved TOPSIS (Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution) model to create a new
multidimensional evaluation index to assess the international competitiveness of rare earth resources exported
by these countries.The findings revealed that: (1) China is the most competitive in rare earths, Australia is the
fastest growing competitive, and Russia and India are less competitive; (2) there are differences in the compo­
nents of rare earths competitiveness among the four countries: China’s economic accumulation and trade are
firmly in first place, while Australia’s infrastructure is its main driving force to improve its rare earths
competitiveness, Russia is more competitive in science and technology innovation, and India lags behind the
other three countries in terms of competitiveness in most dimensions. In response to the above findings, this
paper put forward corresponding policy recommendations.

1. Introduction
As an important material basis for the survival and development of
human society, strategic mineral resources are an important support for
national economic development and occupy an extremely important
position in national security, while rare earths are one of the most
important strategic minerals in the world today (Zhang, 2022). Since
2008, the United States, the European Union and Japan have issued
reports that rare earth elements have been identified as the key materials
for the development of strategic emerging industries. With the rapid
growth of the green energy market and the widespread adoption of new
products and technologies in the global market, the global demand for
rare earths will continue to rise, which puts great pressure on the
existing rare earth supply chain (Zhou et al., 2017). China is a major
country in the rare earth industry and its rare earth industry has shown
strong competitiveness, but much of this competitiveness is based on
comparative advantages in natural resources and production costs and
will not provide long-term momentum for growth in the industry’s
competitiveness (Li et al., 2005). In recent years, several global mining
companies have been working to establish sustainable value-added rare
earth element (REE) supply chains to compete with China (Barakos
et al., 2022), and some countries may be displacing China’s exports of
rare earth products (Sanyal et al., 2013). Therefore, it is essential to
analyze the competitiveness of China’s rare earth industry. The impact
of the COVID-19 pandemic on the trade environment has to some extent
cut off the world’s original rare earth supply chain and may facilitate the
restructuring of the original competitiveness pattern. According to the
United States Geological Service (USGS), Australia ranks third in the
world in terms of rare earth production, closely followed by India and
Russia. In terms of rare earth reserves, these three countries rank fifth,
fourth, and third respectively. In recent times, the Australian federal
government has implemented a series of new national mineral resource
policies and specific initiatives. The objective is to uphold the global
competitiveness of the rare earth industry and maximize the utilization
of resource wealth. In 2019, Australia released a list of 24 key minerals
with significant resource potential and production capacity for the

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: guoqing@gdufs.edu.cn (Q. Guo).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2023.103821
Received 4 February 2023; Received in revised form 23 May 2023; Accepted 13 June 2023
Available online 17 June 2023
0301-4207/© 2023 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Q. Guo and W. You
global market. In 2008, Russia adopted a rare earth policy that banned
foreign investment in the development and production of special metals
and alloys, including rare earths. In 2019, the Russian government
reduced the tax on rare earth mining from 8% to 4.8% to stimulate
companies’ enthusiasm for rare earth development, and the Russian rare
earth industry is expected to compete with China in the context of the
global energy transition (Cherepovitsyn and Solovyova, 2022). Ac­
cording to statistics, India ranks fifth in the world in terms of rare earth
reserves in 2021 with the capacity to supply countries such as the US on
a large scale. India has announced plans to build up rare earth reserves
in its eastern region in 2020. However, the Indian rare earth industry
suffers from a disconnect between the research community and the in­
dustry, and lacks the support of a national strategy that would extend
the rare earth value chain (Chandrashekar and Sundaresan, 2016). For
China, India, Russia and Australia are strong rivals in terms of rare earth
reserves and high technology, and they are at the center of a geopolitical
quagmire like China. For example, China-Australia relations have
experienced a gradual deterioration in recent years. In 2018, Australia
made a significant move by opting to exclude Huawei and ZTE from
participating in the development of 5G technology in the country. This
decision was influenced by trade frictions between China and the United
States; the China-india border conflict has a long history; the
Russia-Ukraine conflict is the most significant event in the international
geopolitical and security arena since the end of the Cold War, and it has
also propelled the China-Russia relationship into a new phase. Rare
earths are essential for many military and weapons manufacturing and
are closely related to national defence security. The political environ­
ment of each country will largely affect the demand for rare earth
products in each country, and thus the development of the rare earth
industry. Therefore, an analysis of the international competitiveness of
rare earth industry in these four countries is conducive to a deeper un­
derstanding of the international status of each country’s rare earth in­
dustry, and also helps to understand the changing trends of the
international competitiveness of each country’s rare earth industry.
2. Review of the literature
The search reveals that the existing related research directions
mainly include the international competitiveness of rare earth resources,
the factors influencing the competitiveness of Chinese rare earth re­
sources and the rare earth industry chain.
2.1. Research on the international competitiveness of rare earth resources
A number of scholars have focused on analyzing the potential
competitiveness of rare earth resources in specific countries. For
instance, Pimenova et al. (2022) argued that while China currently
dominates about 60% of the rare earth metals market, Russia possesses
significant potential to compete in this field. Shi (2012) employed Por­
ter’s diamond framework to analyze the competitiveness of China’s rare
earth industry and concludes that it is not competitive. Kryukov et al.
(2020) suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic may facilitate a
restructuring of the existing competitiveness pattern, presenting an
opportunity for Russia to shape the competitiveness of its rare earth
industry. Bao (2019) utilized the trade competitiveness index to mea­
sure the trade competitiveness of rare earth resources in China, India,
Canada, Russia, and South Africa. The results indicated that China ex­
hibits much higher rare earth trade competitiveness compared to other
countries. Zhang et al. (2022) examined the evolution of the global rare
earth competition landscape and observe that competition is most
intense in downstream industries, with China and Germany displaying
significant competitiveness in the downstream chain.
2
Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821
2.2. A study of the factors influencing the competitiveness of rare earths in
China
Studies on the factors influencing China’s rare earth competitiveness
have mainly focused on national policies. Zhang et al. (2015) found that
a series of rare earth export policies introduced by China have effectively
improved the market dominance and price sensitivity of Chinese rare
earth resources; Yu and Yi (2013) and Pan et al. (2021) showed that
environmental regulations have a greater role in promoting China’s rare
earth export competitiveness. Pan and Wei (2013) analysed data on
China’s rare earth trade with 18 countries and found that different types
of institutional distance will have different effects on China’s rare earth
exports. Furthermore, certain studies have delved into the analysis of
costs and subsidies. For instance, Zhao et al. (2016) discovered that
Chinese rare earth firms possess a competitive advantage over their US
counterparts in terms of cost structure and revenue profile.
2.3. Research on the rare earth industry chain
Some scholars based their analysis on global or multi-country chains.
For example, Tang et al. (2022) discovered that Pacific Rim countries
like China, the United States, and Japan dominate the trade network of
rare earth resource-based products. Salim et al. (2022) offered four
measures to increase the supply security of rare earth resources: circular
economy techniques, supply chain agility, domestic supply building,
and investigating resources outside land-based mining. Klossek et al.
(2016) investigated a variety of distortions in rare earth markets,
including conflicting political and economic models, resource nation­
alism, market opacity, lack of trust, and inadequate collaboration,
among others. Feng et al. (2012) compared the differences in industrial
competitiveness between China and Japan, suggesting that China’s in­
dustrial upgrading and R&D of high value-added products should be
further strengthened. Zhu and Hou (2017), Liu (2016) argued that rare
earth permanent magnet materials are an important component, but
there exist differences between China, the US and Japan in terms of
high-end applications and R&D of rare earth materials.
There were also scholars who analysed the industrial chain of indi­
vidual countries in depth, For instance, Yu et al. (2017) conducted an
input-output analysis to examinethe relationship between rare earth
mining and other sectors of the national economy. The results showed
that rare earth mining operates as an upstream raw material industry,
exerting a relatively limited demand-driving effect on most industrial
sectors in China. Nguyen and Imholte (2016) found that China’s illegal
rare earth industry has increased its market share, accounting for
22–25% of China’s rare earth supply. Massari and Ruberti (2013)
showed that China has reduced exports of rare earth metals due to
environmental needs, leading to a tight supply of rare earth raw mate­
rials for the European high-tech market. Singh (2021) argued that the
future development of India’s rare earth industry can be achieved
through the planned and rational use of different natural resources.
The literature review showed that more scholars have analysed the
competitiveness of rare earth products and its influencing factors, but
most of this literature is based on national policies. When studying the
competitiveness of the rare earth industry in each country, most scholars
only referred to the trade volume of rare earth products in one country
for research and analysis. Therefore, this paper uses the projection
tracing method and the modified TOPSIS model to analyze the inter­
national competitiveness of the rare earth industry in these four coun­
tries, in order to understand the changing trend of the competitiveness of
the rare earth industry in each country, and to enrich the theoretical
research on the competitiveness of rare earth to a certain extent.
Q. Guo and W. You Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821

3. Data sources and determination of the weights of evaluation identifies the infrastructure dimension(indicators: container port traffic,
indicators railway lines, railways, and cargo transportation). Additionally, it is
worth noting that relying solely on quantitative analysis of a country’s
3.1. Data sources industrial development may overlook certain details. Therefore, this
paper takes into account the approach adopted by Su (2004), who
This paper covers the major rare earth exports from China, Australia, combines qualitative and quantitative methods to evaluate the
Russia and India. In this study, we have selected rare earth data covering competitiveness of the rare earth industry. Taking into consideration the
the EU28 and the rest of the world. As the 6-digit codes may contain availability of data, this study also refers to Xia (2019), who selected the
other mineral products that are not rare earth products, in order to industrial environment as the sixth dimension for measurement,
reduce the interference in the study results due to the type of com­ encompassing qualitative indicators (16) to (18). In summary, this paper
modity, we have chosen 8-digit commodity codes in collecting trade finally selected six dimensions of STI, factors of production, economic
data of rare earth products from each country. The HS codes of rare earth accumulation, industrial environment, infrastructure, and trade situa­
products are shown in Table 1. The HS codes used in this study and the tion, with a total of 18 indicators. The specific division of dimensions
trade data collected were sourced from the CBC Metals website. The and indicators is shown in Table 2. Among them, the data of rare earth
study period is from 2006 to 2020, covering the international financial reserves and rare earth production are from the USGS; RCA, TC, Rare
crisis in 2008, the continuous reduction of China’s rare earth export earth exports are from CBC Metals; the data of the remaining quantita­
quota from 2006 to 2010, the abandonment of China’s rare earth quota tive indicators are from the World Development Index (WDI). To
policy in 2014, and the Sino-US trade war in 2018. quantify the qualitative indicators, this paper employs the Delphi
method, which involves conducting empirical analysis through expert
3.2. Evaluation indicators consultation questionnaires. A total of 15 industry authorities were
invited to participate in 2–3 rounds of expert consultation and evalua­
To study the competitiveness of the rare earth industry in China, tion, ensuring a more consistent set of responses.
Australia, Russia and India, this paper selects rare earth reserves, rare In order to verify whether the selected indicators have validity, this
earth production and rare earth product exports as individual indicators study used SPSS 25.0 to conduct KMO and Bartlett’s test on the selected
of production factors and trade situation. Economic development pro­ indicators, the results are shown in Table 3, the KMO of the data used is
vides financial support for rare earth development and is an important 0.786 (>0.5) and the p-value of Bartlett’s sphericity test is 0.000, indi­
factor affecting the competitiveness of rare earths (Zhao et al., 1998), cating that the data set is very suitable for factor analysis.
and rare earth market consumption receives the influence of industrial
growth rate (Du et al., 2020); the development of social environment 3.3. Determination of weights
reflects whether the environment is suitable for the sustainable devel­
opment of rare earth industry (Yan et al., 2009); production factors are 3.3.1. Entropy method
the basic elements and important guarantee for the development of rare The entropy method determines objective weights based on the in­
earth industry; the core of rare earth industry competitiveness lies in formation entropy of the indicators, which is negatively correlated with
technological innovations (Leng et al., 2021). With reference to the the amount of information it provides. The entropy value method is an
above scholars’ selection of indicators, this study selects relevant in­ objective assignment method with objective advantages, but it does not
dicators involving four dimensions: technological innovation, produc­ reflect the degree of importance attached to different indicators by the
tion factors, economic accumulation, and industrial environment. In participating decision makers. When assigning weights to indicators, the
addition, infrastructure is particularly important in the competitiveness inherent statistical laws and authority values between indicator data
evaluation system of the rare earth industry, and its absence may lead to should be considered. Therefore, this paper adopts a combined assign­
low competitive assessment results (Silva et al., 2018), so this paper ment method that combines entropy value method and projection pur­
suit method to make up for the shortage brought by single assignment.
Table 1 In this study, this paper uses Python for the calculation of entropy
Product names and their HS codes. method weights. The main steps are as follows.
Product name HS Code Product name HS Code
A. Standardization of data across indicators
Rare Earth Ore 25309020 Chlorinated rare earths 28469029
Scandium metal 28053019 Mixed chlorinated rare earths 28469028
Neodymium 28053011 Lanthanum chloride 28469023 Table 2
metal Classification of evaluation dimensions and indicators.
Dysprosium 28053012 Lanthanum carbonate 28469041
Dimensionality Indicators
metal
Terbium metal 28053013 Cerium carbonate 28461030 Economic accumulation (1)Gross Domestic Product
Yttrium oxide 28469011 Dysprosium carbonate 28469043 (2)Population
Lanthanum oxide 28469012 Rare earth carbonate 28469049 (3)Industrial Value Added
Cerium oxide 28461010 Mixed rare earth carbonate 28469048 Factors of production (4)Total Labor Force Participation Rate
Neodymium 28469013 Other cerium compounds 28461090 (5)Rare Earth Production
oxide (6)Rare Earth Reserves
Dysprosium 28469015 Rare earth permanent magnets 85051110 Science and Technology (7)Rare Earth Patents
oxide Innovation (8)Rare Earth R&D Expenditure
Terbium oxide 28469016 Uncut formed cerium iron and 36069019 (9)Non-ferrous metal research employees
other ignition alloys Infrastructure (10)Container port traffic
Cerium 28461020 Cerium iron and other ignition 36069011 (11)Railway lines
hydroxide alloys that have been cut to shape (12)Railroad, cargo transportation
for direct use Trade situation (13)RCA
Rare earth oxide 28469019 NdFeB magnetic powder 72029912 (14)TC
Praseodymium 28469017 Other NdFeB alloys 72029919 (15)Export value
oxide Industrial Environment (16)National Will to Develop Rare Earths
Dysprosium 28469022 Quick-set permanent magnets 72029911 (17)Strength of rare earth backbone enterprises
chloride (18)The degree of perfection of rare earth business
Terbium chloride 28469011 Thorium ore and its concentrates 26122000 environment

3
Q. Guo and W. You Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821

Table 3 normalized to obtain the projection weights βj . The results are shown in
KMO and Bartlett’s test. column (3) of Table 4. The final combination of entropy weights and
KMO Number of sampling tangibles 0.786 projection weights is performed using the combined assignment
Bartlett’s sphericity test Approximate cartesian 2979.655 method.
Degrees of freedom 153 Considering that there are often more indicators in the project
Saliency 0.000
evaluation and the weights generally do not differ much, in order to
Data source: authors’ calculations based on SPSS 25.0. highlight the importance differences between indicators as much as
possible, this paper selects the multiplicative combination weighting
B. Finding the ratio of each evaluation object under each indicator method, and Equation (1) is the final indicator weights ωj (j is the jth
C. Find the entropy value of an indicator indicator, m is the total number of indicators).
D. Calculation of the weight of each indicator by entropy value αj β j
ωj = ∑
m (1)
The final calculated entropy weights αj as shown in column (1) of αj βj
Table 4.
j=1

4. TOPSIS model
3.3.2. Projection pursuit method
Projection Pursuit is a class of statistical methods for processing and
4.1. Find the optimal vector and the Ci value
analyzing high-dimensional data. It’s basic idea is to project high-
dimensional data onto a low-dimensional (1–3 dimensions) subspace
TOPSIS model is called "Approximating Ideal Solution Ranking
and find a projection that reflects the structure or characteristics of the
Method" in Chinese, which is a method to rank the evaluation objects
original high-dimensional data for the purpose of studying and
according to their proximity to the idealized target, and is a distance
analyzing high-dimensional data. In 1974, Friedman and Tukey of
comprehensive evaluation method. The basic idea is to assume the
Stanford University in the US first named the method Projection Pursuit.
positive and negative ideal solutions, measure the distance between
In this paper, the projection pursuit model is constructed based on ge­
each sample and the positive and negative ideal solutions, and get the
netic algorithm, and the final calculated projection directions are shown
relative closeness to the ideal solution, and then rank the evaluation
in column (2) of Table 4. Subsequently, the projection directions are
objects. The specific steps and concepts are as follows.

Table 4
A. The standardization matrix is obtained after normalizing the data
Weighting factors for each indicator.
according to equation (2)
Name of indicator Entropy Projection Standardization of Portfolio
power direction projection weights weights x(i, j) − x(min, j)
x∗ (i, j) = (2)
αj βj ωj x(max, j) − x(min, j)

(1) (2) (3) (4) x(i,j) is the initial value of the jth (j = 1, 2, …, m) indicator for the ith
(i = 1, 2, …, n) sample; x(min, j), x(max, j) are the minimum and
Gross Domestic 0.0728 0.4010 0.7874 0.1158
Product maximum values of the jth indicator, respectively.
Population 0.1353 0.0023 0.0041 0.0011
Industrial Value 0.0945 0.4758 0.9343 0.1782 B. Multiply the normalization matrix with the combination weights
Added yields the normalization matrix R = r(i,j)n×m
Total Labor Force 0.0107 0.0340 0.0663 0.0014
Participation
C. Determine the positive and negative ideal solutions
Rate
Rare Earth 0.1068 0.4971 0.9762 0.2106 A positive ideal solution means that each indicator is the best value
Production in the sample, and a negative ideal solution means that each indicator is
Rare Earth 0.0647 0.1874 0.3678 0.0481
the worst value in the sample.
Reserves
Rare Earth Patents 0.0669 0.0037 0.0068 0.0009
Positive ideal solution R+ = {r(max,1) r(max,2) … r(max,m)}
Rare Earth R&D 0.0342 0.0013 0.0021 0.0001
Expenditure
Negative ideal solution R- = {r(min,1) r(min,2) … r(min,m)}
Non-ferrous metal 0.1712 0.0005 0.0005 0.0002
research
The positive and negative ideal solutions for this study are:
employees
Container port 0.1034 0.5092 1.0000 0.2088
Rþ = {0.9991, 0.9238, 0.9994, 0.9388, 0.9995, 0.9979, 0.9103,
traffic 0.7118, 0.7327, 0.9995, 0.8802, 0.8452, 0.9945, 0.5000, 0.9990,
Railway lines 0.0226 0.0073 0.0139 0.0006 0.8342, 0.7242, 0.8213}
Railroad, cargo 0.0364 0.0033 0.0061 0.0004 R- = {0.0009, 0.0762, 0.0006, 0.0612, 0.0005, 0.0021, 0.0897,
transportation
0.2882, 0.2673, 0.0005, 0.1198, 0.1548, 0.0055, 0.5000, 0.0010,
RCA 0.0513 0.0884 0.1732 0.0179
TC 0.0457 0.0002 0.0000 0.0005 0.1658, 0.2758, 0.1787}
Export value 0.1010 0.2495 0.4897 0.0999 D. Calculate the distance of each sample from the positive and
National Will to 0.0987 0.0012 0.0020 0.0004 negative ideal solution.
Develop Rare
The traditional TOPSIS method usually establishes an optimal posi­
Earths
Strength of rare 0.0630 0.0009 0.0013 0.0002
tive ideal solution and a worst negative ideal solution, calculates the
earth backbone distance between a study solution and the ideal solution, and thus ob­
enterprises tains the closeness of the solution to the best solution, which is used as
The degree of 0.0508 0.0020 0.0035 0.0004 an evaluation criterion. This method has no strict restrictions on data
perfection of
distribution and sample content, and data calculation is simple and easy
rare earth
business (Kou and Li, 2022). Nowadays, "Euclidean distance" is frequently
environment employed to calculate the proximity of the research solution to the ideal
solution (Luo and Pang, 2011). However, the "Euclidean distance"
Data source: authors’ calculations based on Matlab software.

4
Q. Guo and W. You Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821

evaluation solution may be close to the negative ideal solution while
being close to the ideal answer (Zhang et al., 2006). To avoid this
drawback, this study refers to Li et al. (2011) and discards the traditional
thinking by introducing the Chi-square test idea, assuming that the so­
lution set and the ideal solution are in the same set, and solving for their
expected values, and comparing the deviation of the expected values
with the solution to determine the consistency of the two solution sets.
The Chi-square Distances are used instead of Euclidean distances to
determine the extent to which the solution is close to the ideal solution,
and the Chi-square Distances of the solution from positive and negative
ideal solutions are shown in equations (3) and (4).
m { } slightly in 2010. However, the difference in competitiveness between
∑ [r(i, j) − e+ (i, j)]2 [r(max, j) − e(max, j)]2
D+i = + (3)
+
e (i, j) e(max, j)
j=1
and the growth rate of these four countries from 2006 to 2020 in Table 6,
and use Fig. 1 to clearly show the trend of the Ci index values.
In the past 15 years, Australia has demonstrated the highest growth
rate in terms of the competitiveness of its rare earth industry, with a rate
of 34.67%. China, India, and Russia follow closely behind with growth
rates of 31.62%, 17.80% and 12.07%, respectively. When considering
the Ci index values, China consistently maintains a higher position
compared to the other three countries. India exhibits the weakest
competitiveness, while the competitiveness gap between Russia and
Australia is relatively smaller. Prior to 2010, Australia was less
competitive than Russia but started to decline after surpassing Russia
the two countries has been diminishing since 2017. It is evident that the
international competitiveness of the rare earth industry in all four

countries has shown a positive upward trend. Particularly noteworthy is

m { }
∑ [r(i, j) − e− (i, j)]2 [r(min, j) − e(min, j)]2 the significant growth rate of Australia, which currently ranks third in
D−i = + (4)
j=1
e− (i, j) e(min, j) terms of Ci index value but displays strong and promising development
prospects for its rare earth industry.
D+ i and Di are positive and negative ideal
−
solutions respectively； In order to further analyze the competitiveness of each country in
e+ (i, j)， e− (i, j)，e(max, j)和e(min, j) are calculated by formula (5), (6), various aspects of rare earth industry, this study further measured the Ci
(7), (8) respectively. index of each dimension of the four countries and ranked the four
∑
n countries on these six dimensions of competitiveness in Table 7. In
r(i, j) × r(i, j) addition, in order to observe more clearly the trends in the competi­
e+ (i, j) = ∑
m
i=1
∑m (5) tiveness of each dimension in each country, the evolution of the four
r(i, j) + r(max, j) countries in the different dimensions is plotted in Fig. 2. As can be seen
in Table 7:
j=1 j=1

∑
n
r(i, j) × r(i, j) (1) In terms of economic accumulation, China and Australia have
e− (i, j) = ∑
m
i=1
∑
m (6) higher Ci index values. China’s economy has experienced signif­
r(i, j) + r(min, j) icant growth since 2006, supported by the demographic dividend
j=1 j=1
and technological learning (Fang et al., 2022). China’s Ci values
∑
n have shown a rapid increase from 0.2517 in 2006 to 0.6251 in
r(max, j) × r(i, j) 2020. Australia’s Ci values have also increased overall, but at a
e(max, j) = ∑
m ∑
m
i=1
(7) slower rate compared to China. Although India’s Ci value is
j=1
r(i, j) +
j=1
r(max, j) lower, it exhibits an upward trend. On the other hand, Russia’s
current economic development does not align with its interna­
∑
n tional status and influence (Yuan, 2020), with the lowest Ci value
r(min, j) × r(i, j) among the four countries, consistently hovering around
e(min, j) = ∑
m ∑
m
i=1
(8) 0.02–0.04, albeit with a slight increase. Overall, the Ci values of
j=1
r(i, j) +
j=1
r(max, j) these four countries have been consistently increasing year by
year.
The closeness of the evaluated object to the optimal solution ac­ (2) In terms of trade, the competitiveness of China and Australia
cording to the cardinal distances obtained from Eq (9). fluctuates more frequently, while the remaining two countries
D−i show subtler changes. China has consistently held the first posi­
Ci = ( ) (9) tion among the four countries, while Russia and India have Ci
D+ + D−i
lower values. Although Russia and India rank fourth and fifth,
i

Table 5 shows the results of the ranking of the competitiveness of

rare earth industries in the Australia, China, Russia and India based on
2020 data. Table 6
Ci Index for China, India, Russia and Australia in 2006–2020.
Year China India Russia Australia
4.2. Dynamic assessment of the competitiveness of rare earth resources
2006 0.5050 0.1860 0.2866 0.2295
2007 0.5372 0.1851 0.2978 0.2496
To further analyze the magnitude and dynamic trends of the inter­ 2008 0.5510 0.1863 0.3080 0.2651
national competitiveness of rare earth industries in the four countries, 2009 0.5391 0.1871 0.3042 0.2664
this paper presents the four countries’ Ci index values from 2006 to 2020 2010 0.5925 0.1886 0.3100 0.3283
2011 0.6690 0.1902 0.3176 0.2875
2012 0.6357 0.1938 0.3212 0.3039
Table 5 2013 0.6331 0.1975 0.3231 0.3046
Competitiveness Ranking of Rare earth by China, Australia, Russia and India in 2014 0.6343 0.2022 0.3270 0.3030
2020. 2015 0.6364 0.2062 0.3285 0.2979
2016 0.6421 0.2110 0.3265 0.2878
Nation D+ D- Ci Rank
2017 0.6419 0.2177 0.3344 0.2944
China 1.3769 2.7290 0.6646 1 2018 0.6600 0.2223 0.3339 0.3060
India 3.0372 0.8519 0.2191 4 2019 0.6669 0.2217 0.3270 0.3098
Russia 2.7555 1.3036 0.3212 2 2020 0.6646 0.2191 0.3212 0.3091
Australia 2.8902 1.2930 0.3091 3 Growth Rate 31.62% 17.80% 12.07% 34.67%

Data source: authors’ calculations based on formula. Data source: Authors’ calculations based on formula.

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Fig. 1. China, India, Russia, Australia, 2006–2020 Ci Trends in indices.

Table 7
Competitiveness ranking of the four countries in different dimensions.
Year Country A B C D E F Year Country A B C D E F

2006 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2014 China 1 1 2 1 1 1

India 4 3 4 4 3 4 India 4 3 4 3 2 4
Russia 2 4 1 3 2 2 Russia 2 4 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 4 2 Australia 3 2 3 2 3 2
2007 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2015 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 3 4 3 3 4 India 4 4 4 3 2 4
Russia 2 4 1 4 2 2 Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 4 2 Australia 3 2 3 2 3 2
2008 China 1 1 3 1 1 1 2016 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 3 4 4 3 4 India 4 4 4 3 2 4
Russia 2 4 1 3 2 2 Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 2 2 4 2 Australia 3 2 3 2 3 2
2009 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2017 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 4 4 3 3 4 India 4 4 4 3 3 4
Russia 2 3 1 4 2 2 Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 4 2 Australia 3 2 3 2 2 2
2010 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2018 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 4 4 3 3 4 India 4 2 4 3 3 4
Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2 Russia 2 4 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 2 2 Australia 3 3 3 2 2 2
2011 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2019 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 4 4 3 3 4 India 4 4 4 3 3 4
Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2 Russia 2 2 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 2 2 Australia 3 3 3 2 2 2
2012 China 1 1 1 1 1 1 2020 China 1 1 2 1 1 1
India 4 4 4 3 2 4 India 4 3 4 3 3 4
Russia 2 3 2 4 4 2 Russia 2 2 1 4 4 2
Australia 3 2 3 2 3 2 Australia 3 4 3 2 2 2
2013 China 1 1 2 1 1 1 2013 Russia 2 3 1 4 4 2
India 4 4 4 3 2 4 Australia 3 2 3 2 3 2

Data source: Authors’ calculations based on formula. A, B, C, D, E, F represent Factors of production, trade, science and technology innovation, economic accumu­
lation, industrial environment, infrastructure, respectively.

respectively, in terms of rare earth reserves worldwide, India’s
annual mining capacity is only about 3000 tons, resulting in a low
international market share for rare earths. In contrast, Russia has
shown an upward trend. The Russian government reduced the
rare earth mining tax from 8% to 4.8% in 2019 to incentivize
companies to develop rare earths due to their significant trade
potential. Australia’s Ci value demonstrates an overall downward
trend, decreasing from 0.2668 in 2006 to 0.0282 in 2020. Addi­
tionally, political tensions between China and Australia may lead
China to restrict the import of rare earth ores from Australia,
negatively impacting Australia’s rare earth industry (Wang,
2020).
(3) In terms of STI, China’s growth in this dimension is the most
significant, while Australia and India exhibit more stability and
Russia shows frequent fluctuations but with an overall decreasing
trend. China’s Ci value has risen from 0.3529 in 2006 to 0.6371 in
2020, indicating a rapid increase in China’s rare earth science
and technology innovation strength, with a growth rate of
80.53%. The Ci values of the remaining three countries show
smaller changes. Australia, with its strong R&D capabilities in
mineral resources, world-class mining engineering schools, and
federal scientific and industrial research organizations, is grad­
ually increasing its competitiveness and ranks second by 2020.
India’s consistent fourth-place position suggests that the country
still has significant room for growth in rare earth innovation and
investment.
(4) In terms of factors of production, China holds the number one
position. China is a major player in the rare earth industry,
leading the world in rare earth resources, production, consump­
tion, and exports (Lee and Dacass, 2022). Exports from China
typically account for about 80% of global demand for rare earths
(according to USGS). Russia and Australia have lower Ci values
compared to China, although their rare earth reserves are not
scarce. While Australian manufacturers have increased produc­
tion in their pilot plants, they are still less competitive overall. In
contrast, India’s Ci value consistently ranks fourth and shows a

6
Q. Guo and W. You
Fig. 2. Index trends of China, India, Russia, and Australia in different dimension.
decreasing trend. Although India possesses a significant amount
of rare earth resources, limited technology results in low rare
earth production. Additionally, despite enjoying a demographic
dividend, India has struggled to provide sufficient employment
opportunities, resulting in a low employment rate.
(5) In terms of infrastructure, China consistently maintains its first
rank and has shown an upward trend, reaching a Ci value of
0.8664 in 2020. The improvement of infrastructure is a crucial
factor driving the long-term development of Australian industries
(Fan et al., 2018). Australia has perennially held the second rank
in this dimension. However, Russia and India have lower Ci
values, ranking third and fourth, respectively. Russia has a rela­
tively low proportion of investment in infrastructure, resulting in
infrastructure construction lagging behind (Chang and Zhao,
2019). India faces challenges such as aging railroad facilities,
stations in disrepair, and opposition from landowners and
farmers regarding the construction of railroads passing through
cultivated land. These challenges directly impact the speed of
railroad construction.
(6) In terms of the industrial environment, the competitiveness of all
countries is increasing. China remains in the first position,
consistently implementing various policies to promote industrial
governance, transformation, and upgrading in the rare earth in­
dustry (Zhou et al., 2020). Australia ranks second, and since
2017, it has introduced the National Mineral Resources Explo­
ration Strategy 2017–2022 and the Roadmap for Unlocking
Australia’s Future Development Opportunities, indicating a focus
on enhancing competitiveness. India and Russia hold the third
and fourth positions, respectively. However, it can be seen that in
2020, their Ci values are all greater than 0.5. In 2015, India
invested $450 million to develop 3 million tons of rare earth
projects, aiming to reduce its dependence on China, as reported
by Rare Earth Information. Russia, on the other hand, seeks to
attract Indian investors to the Far East for rare earth mining,
highlighting the strong determination of these countries to
develop the rare earth industry.
4.3. Assessment results
(1) Taking a static perspective, the rare earth industry in China
demonstrates strong overall competitiveness, while the remain­
ing three countries show weaker competitiveness. China’s rare
7
Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821
earth industry consistently maintains the first position in terms of
overall competitiveness, with a Ci value of 0.6646 in 2020. In
contrast, Australia, India, and Russia lag far behind China, with Ci
values of 0.3091, 0.2191, and 0.3212, respectively, all less than
half of China’s.
(2) Across different dimensions, the competitiveness of the four
countries varies widely. China consistently holds the top position
in terms of economic accumulation and trade. Australia’s
competitiveness is improving in the industrial environment
dimension, while its trade dimension is decreasing, but its
infrastructure dimension consistently ranks second. Russia’s rare
earth industry demonstrates more competitiveness in STI and
trade, although its infrastructure dimension still lags behind.
India consistently exhibits the lowest competitiveness in tech­
nology innovation and the industrial environment, but its eco­
nomic accumulation is slightly higher than Russia’s.
(3) From a dynamic perspective, the trends in the competitiveness of
the rare earth industry differ among the four countries. China’s Ci
value has experienced a continuous rise from 0.5049 in 2006 to
0.6690 in 2011. Although it declined in 2011, it started to rise
again and reached 0.6646 in 2020. India’s competitiveness fluc­
tuates more frequently, with limited improvement in the rare
earth industry over the past decade, with Ci values of 0.1859
(2006) and 0.2190 (2020). Australia’s Ci values have fluctuated
between 0.22 and 0.29 from 2006 to 2016, but since 2016, it has
consistently increased to 0.3090 in 2020. Russia’s competitive­
ness has remained relatively stable, with some fluctuations in Ci
values over the years, but the changes are not significant, with Ci
values of 0.2865 (2006) and 0.3211 (2020) respectively.
5. Discussion and contributions
Existing methods to measure the competitiveness of a country’s
products mainly include the CMS model, TC index, RCA index, all of
them only consider a country’s trade data and ignore factors such as
economic accumulation that play a greater influence on the competi­
tiveness of a country’s industry. Therefore, the multidimensional in­
dicators we established break through the limitations of any single
industry evaluation indicator; in order to overcome the shortcomings of
a single weight, this study uses the combined weights of entropy
weighting and projection tracing method as the final weights of each
index; this study discards the traditional Euclidean distance and uses
Q. Guo and W. You
Chi-square Distance to calculate the distance between each scenario and
the positive and negative ideal solutions, which takes into account the
distance between indicators and between different variables under the
same indicator. Compared to the Euclidean distance, the Chi-square
Distance overcomes the influence of correlation between indicators
and improves the discriminatory ability of the model. In addition, this
article evaluates the competitiveness of different countries in various
dimensions of rare earths. However, the research findings fail to reflect
the relative competitiveness of countries in different segments of the
rare earth industry chain (upstream, midstream, downstream) in a
straightforward manner. This could be considered a significant limita­
tion of this study. Therefore, we believe that future research directions
could focus on a more detailed examination of the competitiveness of
each segment within a country’s rare earth industry chain.
6. Conclusions and recommendations
6.1. Conclusion
(1) China’s rare earths are more competitive, Australia’s competi­
tiveness is growing fast, Russia and India are less competitive
In terms of Ci value, China has been in the first position, is more
competitive and has a high annual growth rate of 31.62%. In 2020 the
Russia’s Ci value reaches 0.3212, ranking second, but its growth rate is
12.07%, the lowest among the four countries. Australia, despite having a
current value of only 0.3090, exhibits the highest growth rate of 34.67%
among the four countries. This highlights Australia’s potential for
further improvement in the competitiveness of its rare earth industry.
India’s value is lower than 0.30, and its growth rate stands at 17.80%,
indicating that India’s rare earth industry has low competitiveness and
still has significant room for enhancement.
(2) Significant differences in the components of rare earth competi­
tiveness among the four countries
China is firmly in first place in terms of economic accumulation and
trade, while Australia’s infrastructure is the main driver of its compet­
itiveness in rare earths and Russia is more competitive in terms of sci­
ence and technology innovation, but has declined in recent years.
Although India lags behind the other three countries on most di­
mensions, it still has some comparative advantage in factors of pro­
duction. Especially in 2020, India discovered high concentrations of rare
earths.
6.2. Recommendations
(1) China should optimize the structure of its export products and
markets
With the importance attached to the rare earth industry by various
countries, the competition faced by the export of Chinese rare earth
industry has become more and more intense. While China currently
holds the first place in the rare earth industry among the four countries,
it is important to recognize that Australia has shown the fastest growth
rate in competitiveness. Given the competition among global powers
and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, China should focus on timely
adjustments and optimization of the market structure within the rare
earth industry to meet the evolving international demand and ensure
sustainable industry growth. Additionally, China’s scientific and tech­
nological innovation in the rare earth industry lags behind Russia, and
the competitiveness of China’s rare earth industry is concentrated in the
upstream segment (Lai et al., 2022). To foster comprehensive industry
development, it is recommended to increase research and development
efforts, encourage technological innovation among mid- and down­
stream enterprises, and establish effective collaborations between
8
Resources Policy 85 (2023) 103821
enterprises, research institutions, and market transformation of research
outcomes. These measures will help China avoid being overtaken by
Western countries in high-end sectors and promote the overall
advancement of the rare earth industry.
(2) Australia, India and Russia should play to their national strengths
and become more competitive
The components of the competitiveness of the rare earth industry
vary from country to country, so each country should play to its
strengths and avoid its weaknesses. Australia indeed possesses better
infrastructure compared to other countries, but its competitiveness in
science, technology innovation, and production factors still has room for
improvement. The early implementation of rare earth environmental
regulations in Australia has compelled rare earth enterprises to shift
their operations overseas, resulting in significant hindrances to its rare
earth production(Huang et al., 2022). Therefore, Australia should focus
on strengthening the development of the entire rare earth industry
chain, encompassing all stages from rare earth ore mining to processing
and application. The government can incentivize enterprises to invest in
rare earth processing facilities, enhancing local processing capacity and
reducing dependence on imports.
India and Russia possess certain comparative advantages in pro­
duction factors and should actively pursue international partnerships.
This includes cooperation with other countries and regions, as well as
collaboration with major rare earth consuming nations. Additionally,
despite India’s low competitiveness in dimensions such as infrastructure
and economic accumulation, these factors alone cannot facilitate the
development of the rare earth industry. India should concentrate on
developing its economy, improving infrastructure, and enhancing its
technological innovation capacity to establish its own rare earth in­
dustry chain.
While Russia demonstrates high competitiveness in technology and
innovation, its trade situation and industrial environment exhibit low
competitiveness. The government should formulate supportive policies
to bolster the development of the rare earth industry. These may include
fiscal incentives, tax preferences, R&D subsidies, and actively expanding
cooperation with other countries and regions to enhance the develop­
ment and trade of rare earth resources.
Author contributions
Conceptualization, Qing Guo; methodology, Qing Guo; software and
formal analysis, Wenlan You; writing—original draft preparation, Qing
Guo and Wenlan You; writing—review and editing, Qing Guo and
Wenlan You; supervision and funding acquisition, Qing Guo. All authors
have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Funding
This research was supported by the National Social Science Foun­
dation (21CJL007); the Humanities and Social Science Project of China’s
Ministry of Education (20YJC790036); National Innovation and Entre­
preneurship Training Program for College Students: "Great Power Logic
of Rare Earth Development in China: Strategic Security, Key Policies and
Sustainable Development"；Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay
Area Accounting and Economic Development Research Center Project,
Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (YGAZD2022-04); Institute of
City Strategy Studies Project, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies
(JDZB202104); Pacific Island Countries Strategy Research Centre Proj­
ect, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (2021PIC003);Institute for
African Studies, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (HX-FZ2022-
2); Asia-Pacific Security and Economic and Political Cooperation
Research Centre Project, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies
(YT2022001); Guangdong Postgraduate Education Innovation Project
(2022XSLT027); Philosophy and Social Science Development Planning
Q. Guo and W. You
Project of Guangzhou (2021GZGJ07); Center for Translation Studies
Project, Guangdong University of Foreign Studies (CTS202201).
Institutional review board statement
Not applicable.
Informed consent statement
Informed consent was obtained from all the subjects involved in the
study.
Data availability statement
The data and estimation commands that support the findings of this
paper are available on request from the first and corresponding authors.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
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