(introduction...)

Long before the Second World War, economic development in Western Europe and in the United States was based on mineral imports. Yet only since the 1960s have these imports become the main component of domestic supply, in the framework of a growing demand for metals. For example, domestic iron ore production in the early 1970s provided 60% of the needs of Western Europe (against 99% in 1913) and 68% in the USA. In Japan, where mineral resources are totally absent, dependence on imports is much greater. For the non-ferrous metals, imports also provide a very large percentage of the domestic needs of developed countries, ranging from 35% for the USA to 74% for Japan, at the end of the 1960s. These proportions actually increased in the 1970s except in the United States, as is shown in Table 1.1 for 1979:

Table 1.1 Consumption covered by imports (1979) (%)

Source: The Ministry of Industry and Trade of Japan.

Japan and West Germany, where economic growth has been faster than elsewhere in the developed world, are totally dependent on imports for all minerals; the picture is almost the same for Great Britain. The domestic supply of iron ore and bauxite in France is important but dependence on imported minerals is quite considerable. Even in the United States, where mineral resources are abundant, dependence on external sources is by no means negligible, especially for bauxite. The imports of these countries are mainly from the Third World on the one hand, and from Australia, Canada and South Africa on the other. The US is a big producer but an even bigger consumer, and among the West European countries, only Sweden exports a significant quantity of iron ore. The socialist countries' participation in world mineral trade is still minimal, except for bauxite and alumina of which they are buyers rather than sellers. Thus, the Third World provides between 40% and 75% of the mineral imports of the major capitalist economies. Table 1.2 shows the percentage of non-ferrous metals and iron ore imported from the Third World around the mid-1970s:

Table 1.2 Mineral imports from the Third World (1970s) (%)

Source: Estimated from Annales des Mines.

Long before Third World producers associations were set up and the successful negotiations of OPEC carried out, the importing countries attempted to diversify the sources of their mineral imports in order to reduce their dependence on Third World countries.

From the 1950s to the 1970s, the Third World's share in the imports of nine minerals to the US, Western Europe and Japan fell from 80% to 72%, while Australia's and South Africa's share increased from 3% to 12%. Due to the significant increase in imports, however, the Third World's share of exports for the nine minerals rose from 32% of domestic consumption in 1950 to 43% in 1970!

In the early twentieth century some South American and African countries had already been induced (or forced) to specialize in mining in order to serve the 'second industrial revolution', based on steel, electricity and chemicals, which heavily increased the demand for minerals in Europe and North America. But specialization for export became effective only after the Second World War. From the early 1950s to the mid-1970s, metal consumption in industrial countries expanded well beyond their domestic mineral endowments. And free access to Third World minerals was a major element of the economic dynamism of these countries throughout that period.

Mineral specialization in some Third World countries implied a new international division of labour between importers and exporters. This specialization was, of course, imposed on the Third World by the importing countries, and they became increasingly dependent on the availability of cheap mineral imports. Consumption of metal-intensive manufactured goods increased, and industrial activities based on the processing of imported minerals developed. As long as there is no true political autonomy in the exporting countries, this dependency on the part of the importing countries is not even perceived. But as the oil story of the 1970s has shown, once the producers are able to renegotiate the conditions of the availability of their minerals on the world market, the dependency of developed countries on these external sources is sharply revealed. But as we shall see, in the medium term, the OPEC story is not likely to be repeated for minerals.

As a rule, the United States is mainly dependent for its mineral supplies on Latin America, Western Europe on Africa and Japan on Asia and Oceania. Yet new trade flows developed during the 1970s which alter this picture somewhat.

Table 1.3 Distribution of Third World imports as a proportion of total imports (%)

Source: Annales des Mines.

The geographical concentration of imports appears quite clearly in some cases. Africa provides 43% of France's iron ore imports, Latin America supplies 60% of US nonferrous imports and Asia 24% of those of Japan. These flows reflect the persistence of the traditional relations established in the past between the metropoles and their peripheral areas. But there has been some diversification. For instance, one-quarter of French iron ore imports are from Latin America and one-fifth of the Japanese nonferrous imports are from Africa. Africa, however, remains the main supplier of France and Western Europe in general.

The dependence of Western Europe and Japan for non-ferrous metals is even more blatant if we take individual exporting countries. Thus, for copper: Zaire and Zambia, 40% to EEC countries, with Zambia alone providing 30% of British imports and Zaire 62% of Belgian imports. Liberia provides 17% of EEC countries' iron ore and Mauritania 6%.

Western countries' dependence on Africa for Uranium and for rare and precious metals is even greater. With the exception of the US, which is self-sufficient, the uranium needs of the main capitalist countries depend very much on African resources. Africa as a whole provides about 65% of Western Europe's and Japan's uranium (40% excluding South Africa), a situation comparable to the West's heavy dependence upon OPEC for oil during the 1970s.

South Africa is obviously of great strategic importance for the Western system, if only because of its mineral resources. Twenty-five per cent of the uranium resources of the capitalist world are located in South Africa and Namibia, and exports represent 40% of world capital requirements. South Africa is also rich not only in gold, but in such rare metals as platinum, chromium, vanadium and manganese. These metals, for which there is as yet no substitute, are essential for the development of electronic, aeronautic, space and nuclear industries. South Africa's share of the whole world's resources for these minerals is: platinum 73% chromium 68%; manganese 37%; and vanadium 19%. The USSR and Eastern European countries possess a large proportion of world resources of these minerals (for example, platinum 25%; vanadium 74%); South Africa therefore has a quasi-monopoly of these metals within the capitalist world. Other African countries, however, also possess a not inconsiderable proportion of the world resources, such as chromium in Zimbabwe and manganese in Gabon.

The extent of the main industrial countries' dependence upon South Africa for chromium, manganese and platinum is illustrated in Table 1.4.

Table 1.4 South Africa's share of imports, 1977 (%)

Source: The minerals industry in South Africa, Washington, 1979.

South Africa's share of chromium exports is much greater than that of other producers: USSR, Philippines, Turkey, Brazil and Madagascar. France imports considerably more manganese from Gabon than from South Africa, and the USA's imports of this metal from Austrialia, Brazil and Gabon are higher than those from South Africa. Britain, Germany and Japan, however, depend upon South Africa for most of their manganese. The figures for platinum imports for West Germany and France are distorted by the fact that they import the refined metal via Britain and not the raw metal direct from South Africa.

Western countries' deepening dependence on Africa's minerals has been matched by a growing export-oriented specialization on that continent.