Minerals And The Developing Economies

THE FRAMEWORK Consider where you, the reader, would place the emphasis m your answer to the following questions on mineral supply. Do you think of the mineral resources of developing countries in terms of the contribution which they can make to world mineral supply or in terms of the contribution they can make to development of the country? Do you look upon developing countries as a source of minerals for world industry or as a potential enormous market for minerals? If you are from a developed country it would be surprising I£ you did not emphasize the first alternative in each case, but it is also possible that simply raising the questions will call for some mental adjustments, because usually we do not think in these terms. If you are among the two-thirds of the world's population which comes from developing countries, you might well emphasize the second alternative. And to a growing extent during the reaming decades of the 20th century this is where emphasis must be placed. Increasing amounts of the world's mineral production come from countries which are in the early stages of development. Mineral consumers of the world look to these regions for continuing supplies of material to help meet their ever-growing needs; the producing countries look to mineral exports as one means of stimulating and financing their economic development-this seems a happy and fortuitous relationship. But due to the complexities of world mineral supply, it is a relationship which is fraught with potential confusion and misunderstanding. That this is so is not surprising when one considers that many of the producing countries are new countries which are urgently trying to find the path along which they can move towards development; that the direction of the path is by no means clear because various theories of economic development, as a planned and deliberate process, are relatively recent in origin and none are well understood; and that the very concept of the less developed countries (LDC's) is a relatively new one. To further complicate the situation there has never been a clear under- standing of the full role which minerals play in economic development, either in the case of those countries which are already classed as developed, or in the case of countries which are in the process of development. Before embarking on an investigation of some aspects of the relationship between minerals and developing countries, it seems wise to establish broad terms of reference, which may not be totally valid but which will at least give an initial direction for a journey with no clearly definable goal. First it can be noted that the world has been divided somewhat arbitrarily into a group of countries that are termed developed or advanced and a group of countries which