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The rest of this site tracks who holds Canada's critical-mineral ground. This page answers the buyer's next question: what is it for. On 11 December 2024, NATO named 12 defence-critical raw materials, the inputs its member militaries cannot build hardware without. Below, each one is mapped to its specific military applications, to how concentrated its global supply is, and to what Canada actually produces. Every figure links to its public source.
NATO published its list of 12 defence-critical raw materials on 11 December 2024: aluminium, beryllium, cobalt, gallium, germanium, graphite, lithium, manganese, platinum, rare earth elements, titanium and tungsten. The list was developed through a defence-capability-focused methodology with NATO's Industrial Advisory Group.
Budget 2025, tabled in November 2025, allocated $443.0 million over five years starting 2025-26 to Natural Resources Canada and Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada to develop innovative critical-minerals processing technologies, fund joint investments with allies in Canadian critical-minerals projects, and, in the wording of Budget 2025 Chapter 4, 'develop a critical minerals stockpiling mechanism to strengthen Canadian and Allied national security.'
On 31 October 2025, the Government of Canada issued an Order in Council under the Defence Production Act designating certain critical minerals as essential to Canadian defence and national interests, enabling a domestic stockpiling regime and support for allied stockpiling; it was announced during the G7 Energy and Environment Ministers' Meeting in Toronto.
Canada's first Defence Industrial Strategy, launched by Prime Minister Carney on 17 February 2026, commits to accelerate critical-minerals projects and support Canadian supply chains aligned with national defence and allied needs, and states Canada already produces 10 of NATO's 12 defence-critical raw materials, naming aluminum, gallium, germanium, graphite and tungsten as areas of existing capacity. The government committed to publish, by Q2 2026, a detailed plan to expand production, processing, stockpiling and procurement of defence-related critical minerals, coordinated with allies through the G7 Critical Minerals Production Alliance and NATO.
A new Defence Investment Agency, established in October 2025, is tasked with making domestic sourcing of critical raw materials central to defence procurement. Separately, Canada launched a $2-billion Critical Minerals Sovereign Fund, announced around 5 November 2025, providing equity, loan guarantees and offtake agreements for strategic mining projects, and a $371.8-million First and Last Mile Fund for upstream and midstream critical-minerals infrastructure.
NATO's list, published 2024-12-11. For each: what defence hardware needs it, where the world's supply sits, and Canada's position.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China holds about 60% of global primary aluminum smelting capacity and about 60% of alumina output (93 million tonnes in 2025), but only about 2% of global bauxite reserves, making it the world's largest bauxite importer (mainly from Guinea and Australia). Source →
Canadian context
Canada is the world's 4th-largest primary aluminum producer despite mining no bauxite domestically. Ten primary smelters operate in Canada (nine in Quebec, one in Kitimat, BC); Quebec's nine smelters produce about 90% of Canada's aluminum and about 60% of North American output, powered almost entirely by hydroelectricity. NATO Defence Industrial Strategy commentary identifies aluminum as one of the NATO defence-critical minerals Canada already produces at scale.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
The United States dominates global beryllium supply almost entirely through Materion Corporation, the only fully integrated mine-to-metal producer in the Western world, sourced from the Spor Mountain deposit in Utah; the top four global producers hold over 95% combined market share. Source →
Canadian context
Canada has no active commercial beryllium mine or producer. Some Canadian granite formations noted by federal and territorial geological surveys, for example in Yukon, are beryllium-enriched, and beryllium appears on Canada's federal critical minerals list, but this is geological potential and exploration interest, not current production.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
The Democratic Republic of Congo holds roughly 55% of global cobalt reserves and produces about 74% of annual global mined cobalt; downstream refining into battery-grade and superalloy-grade material is predominantly controlled by Chinese industrial capacity. Source →
Canadian context
Cobalt is mined in Canada mainly as a byproduct of nickel operations, for example Vale's Voisey's Bay in Labrador and the Sudbury basin. Electra Battery Materials is building North America's first cobalt sulfate refinery at Temiskaming Shores, Ontario (the historic town of Cobalt), targeting 6,500 tonnes per year of battery-grade cobalt by the end of 2027, backed by a federal Strategic Response Fund investment of about $20 million announced plus Ontario provincial funding.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China produces roughly 99% of the world's gallium and has imposed export restrictions on gallium. Source →
Canadian context
Canada currently has no gallium production, but Teck Resources' Trail Operations smelter in BC plans to add gallium production for the first time as part of an approximately $850 million Trail Strategic Metals Initiative expansion, backed by up to $400 million in proposed federal support, recovering gallium as a byproduct of zinc and lead smelting alongside germanium and antimony.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China dominates global germanium supply and refining and has placed export controls on germanium; defence and security uses account for an estimated 20% to 25% of global germanium demand by value. Source →
Canadian context
Teck Resources' Trail Operations smelter in British Columbia is Canada's only germanium producer and North America's largest, recovering it as a zinc-processing byproduct and serving as the sole supplier of germanium dioxide to the United States. The federal government has committed up to $400 million toward an expansion (Teck's proposed $850 million Trail Strategic Metals Initiative) to double germanium and antimony output and add new gallium capacity.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China produced roughly 79% of world graphite supply and accounts for about 96% of refined, battery-grade graphite production. Source →
Canadian context
Canada currently ranks 8th globally in graphite supply, at about 12,000 tonnes, roughly 0.7% of world supply. Quebec is the centre of Canadian development: Nouveau Monde Graphite's Matawinie mine (under construction, billed as the largest graphite mine planned in the G7, targeting up to 106,000 tonnes per year by 2028) and its larger Uatnan project (potential of about 500,000 tonnes per year); Northern Graphite's Lac-des-Iles mine (about 25,000 tonnes per year) is North America's sole currently producing graphite mine.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China dominates lithium chemical refining and processing capacity globally even though primary mining is more geographically spread (Australia, Chile, China). China's downstream battery-grade lithium processing dominance is part of a broader pattern in which China refines the large majority of critical battery minerals; the IEA finds China dominates refining of 19 of 20 minerals it assessed. Source →
Canadian context
Quebec is Canada's lithium centre: Nemaska Lithium's Whabouchi mine in the James Bay region (owned by US-based Livent Corp and the Quebec government) feeding the Becancour conversion facility, and Sayona Mining and Piedmont Lithium's North American Lithium (NAL) spodumene operation in Abitibi-Temiscamingue. In Manitoba, the Tanco mine (lithium, cesium, tantalum) is owned by China's Sinomine Resource Group, acquired in 2019. In November 2022, Canada ordered Sinomine and two other Chinese firms (Chengze Lithium International and Zangge Mining) to divest stakes in Canadian critical-minerals companies under an Investment Canada Act national-security review, though Sinomine retained ownership of Tanco itself and continues shipping lithium concentrate to China.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China accounts for about 95% of global manganese refining capacity, even though primary mine production is more dispersed (South Africa, Gabon, Australia). Source →
Canadian context
Canada has no current commercial manganese production. The Battery Hill project near Woodstock, New Brunswick (Manganese X Energy Corp / Canadian Manganese) sits on one of North America's largest carbonate-manganese deposits, about 194 million tonnes, and is being advanced toward high-purity battery-grade manganese sulfate production, but remains pre-production. Budget 2025 broadened the Critical Mineral Exploration Tax Credit to include manganese among 12 additional defence and technology-relevant minerals.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
South Africa, Russia and Zimbabwe together control roughly 90% to 99% of global platinum-group-metal supply; South Africa alone supplies about 70% of platinum, and Russia around 10% to 12%, much of it as a byproduct of Nornickel's nickel mining. The range reflects differences in whether Zimbabwe and byproduct output are included. Source →
Canadian context
Canada's primary platinum-group-metal production is Impala Canada's Lac des Iles mine near Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada's only primary palladium-producing operation, with platinum as a co-product, wholly owned by South Africa's Impala Platinum Holdings. Additional platinum-group metals are recovered as byproducts of Sudbury basin nickel-copper mining (Vale, Glencore). The Lac des Iles orebody shares geochemical similarities with South Africa's Bushveld Merensky and UG2 reefs.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China accounts for roughly 69% to 70% of global rare-earth mining and about 90% to 91% of global rare-earth refining and processing. Source →
Canadian context
The Nechalacho project (North T deposit) near Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, was Canada's only operating rare-earths mine and was promoted by Ottawa as part of the response to Chinese rare-earth dominance. Its operator, Vital Metals (Australian), had an agreement to sell processed rare-earth stockpile material to Chinese company Shenghe Resources for $2.6 million; NRCan and then-Minister Jonathan Wilkinson intervened directly to redirect the sale to the Saskatchewan Research Council for $3.3 million instead, keeping the material in Canada.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China and Russia together account for roughly 74% of global titanium sponge-metal production capacity (China about 63%, Russia about 11% in 2024); China also holds 44% of titanium melt and 66% of titanium mill-product global production, with Japan (about 15% of sponge) and emerging suppliers like Saudi Arabia rounding out Western-aligned supply. Source →
Canadian context
Rio Tinto Fer et Titane (RTFT), operating in Quebec since 1950, mines ilmenite at Lac Tio near Havre-Saint-Pierre, the world's largest solid ilmenite deposit, and processes it at its Sorel-Tracy metallurgical complex into titanium dioxide feedstock supplying about 19% of global demand, plus pig iron and, since 2021, scandium at North America's first scandium plant. RTFT is wholly owned by UK and Australia-headquartered Rio Tinto.
Defence applications
Global supply concentration
China produces roughly 83% of the world's tungsten. Source →
Canadian context
Canada's historic producer, the Cantung mine in the Northwest Territories near the Yukon border, operated intermittently from 1962 and closed for good in 2015 when owner North American Tungsten Corp went bankrupt. The Mactung deposit, straddling the Yukon-NWT border and held by Fireweed Metals, is described as the world's largest high-grade tungsten deposit (33 million tonnes at 0.88% WO3); Canada and the US announced a joint investment of about $35 million, including US Department of Defense funds, in Mactung's pre-development in 2024.
Sources
Per-mineral figures link to their own source inline above. The core primary sources for the list and the mandate: