Canada’s order that China divest from Toronto-listed mining companies is a world-changing message: geopolitical risk is real, worsening and will force a new business model.
My argument was that post-Cold War globalisation was over and we had entered a “great delinking”, with a strong possibility of major regional wars. As a result, I stated that global risk is paramount and demands urgent dedicated analysis, anticipation and management. The US struggled to wake up to this new reality, torn by systemic inequality feeding extremism and its faith in globalisation shaken by its new challengers. Europe deluded itself that its social-democratic model made it a post-geopolitical haven for all.
Last Thursday evening my phone started ringing and WhatsApp messages came in furiously soon after I had shared with colleagues, clients and professional acquaintances a seemingly obscure news story: the previous day the Canadian government had ordered that three Chinese companies sell their shareholdings in three Canadian mining companies. None of those who contacted me was directly affected by this order, bar one.
What prompted this “UnCanadian”, according to one acquaintance, action is a rush to secure the minerals that are key to national security and the energy transition. China has acquired control of the majority of either the ore bodies containing these minerals or the companies mining them. It sends them for refining, beneficiation and incorporation to manufactures in China.
The great delinking is all-encompassing and irreversible. What Canada has started others will continue. China will retaliate. A global scramble for critical minerals has begun .
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