royalties

Free rare earths with every tonne, and other reasons Australia lost half the lithium market but kept all the money

Australia's share of China's lithium concentrate imports has almost halved since 2022, but the interesting question is not who took it – it is why they are being paid so much less for it.

By Jamie Wade on July 30, 2026
Efficiency, Production Optimisation, Mineral Processing, Costs, Cost Control, Contract Management, Procurement Efficiency, ESG, Regulatory Adherence, Legislative Updates, Extraction, Mineral Extraction, Resource Sustainability, Geological Surveys, Reserve Estimation, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Mitigation, Exploration, Geological exploration and resource modelling, Geoscience data visualisation and analytics, Exploration technologies and methodologies
Australia, Western Australia, Goldfields-Esperance, South West, Africa, South Africa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Angola, Guinea, Tanzania, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Madagascar
Iron ore, Cobalt, Graphite, Praseodymium, Neodymium, Samarium, Base Metals, Lithium, Copper, Tin, Aluminium/Bauxite

The contractor recovery has a forward visibility problem, and the JV model is quietly rewriting how junior projects get built

There are two stories inside Grant Thornton's latest mining contractors report, and the one getting most of the attention is the wrong one.

By Jamie Wade on April 28, 2026
Efficiency, Production Optimisation, Mineral Processing, Costs, Financial Planning, Contract Management, Procurement Efficiency, ESG, Reclamation Projects, Regulatory Adherence, Long-term Planning, Extraction, Mineral Extraction, Reserve Estimation, Risk, Risk Assessment, Risk Mitigation, Mines & Projects, Project Overviews, Development Stages
Australia, Western Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, North America, Canada
Iron ore, Nickel, Energy Minerals, Coal (Thermal and Metallurgical), Strategic Minerals, Lithium, Precious Metals, Gold, Base Metals, Copper