An Afghan miner pushes a cart in the Karkar coal mine in Pul-i-Kumri, around 170 km north of Kabul, March 8, 2009. REUTERS / Ahmad Masood

Aug 19 (Reuters) – Returning to power in Afghanistan after a 20-year absence, the Taliban have regained control of the natural resources that a former minister of mines in the country once held called could be worth up to $ 3 trillion.

That estimate was made towards the end of the last commodity super cycle in 2010 and could be worth even more now after a global economic recovery from the coronavirus shock pushed prices for everything from copper to lithium soaring this year.

Afghanistan is rich in resources such as copper, gold, oil, natural gas, uranium, bauxite, coal, iron ore, rare earths, lithium, chromium, lead, zinc, precious stones, talc, sulfur, travertine, gypsum and marble.

Below is a breakdown of some of Afghanistan’s key resources, as estimated by the country’s mining department and the U.S. government, and their potential monetary value to the war-torn Afghan economy if security challenges can be overcome.

COPPER

A 2019 report by the Afghan Ministry of Mines and Petroleum puts the country’s copper resources at almost 30 million tons.

A roadmap for the Afghan mining sector published by the ministry in the same year states that an additional 28.5 million tons of copper are in undiscovered porphyry deposits. That would bring the total to nearly 60 million tons, which is worth hundreds of billions of dollars at current prices, as demand for the metal grows.

A consortium of the Metallurgical Corp of China (MCC) (601618.SS) and Jiangxi copper (600362.SS) took on a 30-year lease for the country’s largest copper project, Mes Aynak, in 2008.

This huge asset has yet to be developed, but the 11.08 million tons of copper MCC holds estimates it would be worth over $ 100 billion at current London Metal Exchange prices.

OTHER METALS The 2019 report also states that Afghanistan has more than 2.2 billion tons of steel-making raw material, iron ore valued at over $ 350 billion at current market prices.

Gold resources were much more modest at an estimated 2,700 kg and valued at nearly $ 170 million, while the Afghan ministry also said the base metals aluminum, tin, lead and zinc are “localized” in several areas of the country.

Ministry of Mines and Petroleum Report 2019

LITHIUM AND RARE EARTH

A 2010 Department of Defense internal memo reportedly described Afghanistan as “the Saudi Arabia of lithium“Which means it could be as important to the global supply of battery metal as the Middle Eastern country is to crude oil.

The comparison was made at a time when lithium was already widely used in batteries for electronic devices, but before it became clear how much lithium would be needed for electric vehicle (EV) batteries and the global shift to low carbon vehicles.

A 2017/18 US Geological Survey report states that Afghanistan has occurrences of spodumene, a lithium-containing mineral, but does not provide tonnage estimates, while the 2019 Afghan report does not mention lithium at all.

However, the Mines Ministry’s 2019 report states that Afghanistan contains 1.4 million tons of rare earth minerals, a group of 17 elements valued for their uses in consumer electronics as well as military equipment.

Non-fuel mineral resources based on preliminary assessment in 2007

With hydrocarbon-rich Iran and Turkmenistan to the west, Afghanistan is home to around 1.6 billion barrels of crude oil, 16 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, and another 500 million barrels of liquid natural gas.

That emerges from the 2019 Afghan report, which cites a joint US-Afghan assessment, and implies a value of $ 107 billion for crude oil alone at current market prices.

“Most of the undiscovered crude oil is in the Afghan-Tajik Basin and most of the undiscovered natural gas is in the Amu Darya Basin,” the report said.

GEMSTONES

Afghanistan has historically been an important source of lapis lazuli, a deep blue semi-precious stone that has been mined in the country’s northern Badakhshan province for thousands of years, as well as other gemstones such as rubies and emeralds.

The finest varieties of lapis lazuli can fetch up to $ 150 per carat, according to the 2019 Afghan report, which however notes that the majority of gemstones mined in the country leave the country illegally, mostly to Peshawar in Pakistan, which Afghanistan denied vital income.

Reporting by Tom Daly and Shivani Singh; Editing by Christian Schmollinger

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