The CEO of a major global metals and mining corporation attending the China Development Forum (CDF) 2025 has highlighted the importance of China's economic growth and green development for the industry.
Delivering the opening address of the CDF on Sunday, Chinese Premier Li Qiang reiterated China's commitment to openness and global collaboration, noting that more proactive fiscal policies will be implemented to hit the economic growth rate target of around 5 percent for 2025 announced earlier this year.
In an interview with China Global Television Network (CGTN) on the sideline of the forum, Jakob Stausholm, CEO of the metals firm Rio Tinto, stressed that meeting the growth target, as well as targets in the country's transition to green energy, could translate into significant profits for the company.
"Five percent is a lot for an economy size of China. But we follow it every day because we are selling our products into China. The growth is changing from, traditionally, we have been very much the supplier to the steel industry. Steel demand will continue to be important. But you see as well, the whole green development with solar, electrical vehicles, etc, provides a lot of new demand for aluminum, copper, and battery materials. And we are becoming very big in battery materials," said Stausholm.
"We sell a significant part, even actually more than half of our revenue goes into China. In general, growth is good. And what we see out of the two sessions and what I heard from the Premier this morning is that we see more consumer driven demands, which leads to grow to the economy. And we also see that the property sector has stabilized and is in a better shape than last year. That's very important for us," the CEO said.
Rio Tinto completed its acquisition of Arcadium Lithium for 6.7 billion U.S. dollars on March 5, establishing itself as a global leader in the supply of energy transition materials and a major lithium producer, with one of the world’s largest lithium resource bases.
"We have just two weeks ago finalized a major acquisition of one of the world's largest lithium companies. So we are becoming a major player in lithium. That is, of course, a key material for batteries and for the EVs (electric vehicles). So we see new customers, we see new demand, and the growth rate is amazing. The sale of EVs in January and February is up more than 50 percent over a year ago. That means the demand for lithium is growing up as well," he said.
Leading int'l metals firm sees steely growth prospects in China
Leading int'l metals firm sees steely growth prospects in China
