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Chapter 8
Access to Raw Materials
A Historical, Legal and Geopolitical Vision
Antoine Valéry
A. Valéry ()
French Institute of International Legal Experts, 94, boulevard Flandrin,
75116, Paris, France
e-mail: antoine.valery@gmail.com
Introduction
The importance of raw materials in human activities, their non-renewable nature
and the gradual exhaustion of easily exploited resources have become, over the past
years, a major concern for many States, as well as the international community.
As highlighted by Jean-Yves Perrot, Ifremer’s Chief Executive Officer, “growing
tensions are appearing between mineral availability and global requirements, especially in industrial countries, which continue to rise in number and force (…). The
foreseeable rise in demand, related to world population growth and the rising standard of living in developing countries, considerably reduces the estimated lifespan
of metal reserves.” Access to raw materials today is a geostrategic challenge.
Yet “Natural resources tend to be concentrated in relatively few locations around
the world. This makes for profitable trading opportunities among nations. At the same
time, because natural resources are so crucial to many economic activities, adequate
access to them is regarded as a vital national interest everywhere. Those who possess natural resources may not always wish to trade them, but rather to harness them
domestically as a basis for economic development and diversification.” (World Trade
Organization [WTO], World Trade Report 2010 “Trade in natural resources”, p. 3).
This observation by Pascal Lamy, WTO Director-General, accurately reflects
the current challenges of this reality. Furthermore, the fact that, in 2010, the WTO
devoted its annual report for the first time to trade in natural resources, described
as a “challenge for global governance”, is in itself an indication of increasingly
acute tension in a field which, until then, did not fall within the natural scope of this
organisation’s concerns.
The same goes for the work of the G20 and in particular the Pittsburgh Summit,
at which leaders agreed to “improve the regulation, functioning and transparency of
financial and commodity marketsto address excessive commodity price volatility”,
Y. Fouquet, D. Lacroix (eds.), Deep Marine Mineral Resources,
DOI 10.1007/978-94-017-8563-1_8, © Éditions Quæ 2014
Chapter 8
Access to Raw Materials
A Historical, Legal and Geopolitical Vision
Antoine Valéry
A. Valéry ()
French Institute of International Legal Experts, 94, boulevard Flandrin,
75116, Paris, France
e-mail: antoine.valery@gmail.com
Introduction
The importance of raw materials in human activities, their non-renewable nature
and the gradual exhaustion of easily exploited resources have become, over the past
years, a major concern for many States, as well as the international community.
As highlighted by Jean-Yves Perrot, Ifremer’s Chief Executive Officer, “growing
tensions are appearing between mineral availability and global requirements, especially in industrial countries, which continue to rise in number and force (…). The
foreseeable rise in demand, related to world population growth and the rising standard of living in developing countries, considerably reduces the estimated lifespan
of metal reserves.” Access to raw materials today is a geostrategic challenge.
Yet “Natural resources tend to be concentrated in relatively few locations around
the world. This makes for profitable trading opportunities among nations. At the same
time, because natural resources are so crucial to many economic activities, adequate
access to them is regarded as a vital national interest everywhere. Those who possess natural resources may not always wish to trade them, but rather to harness them
domestically as a basis for economic development and diversification.” (World Trade
Organization [WTO], World Trade Report 2010 “Trade in natural resources”, p. 3).
This observation by Pascal Lamy, WTO Director-General, accurately reflects
the current challenges of this reality. Furthermore, the fact that, in 2010, the WTO
devoted its annual report for the first time to trade in natural resources, described
as a “challenge for global governance”, is in itself an indication of increasingly
acute tension in a field which, until then, did not fall within the natural scope of this
organisation’s concerns.
The same goes for the work of the G20 and in particular the Pittsburgh Summit,
at which leaders agreed to “improve the regulation, functioning and transparency of
financial and commodity marketsto address excessive commodity price volatility”,
Y. Fouquet, D. Lacroix (eds.), Deep Marine Mineral Resources,
DOI 10.1007/978-94-017-8563-1_8, © Éditions Quæ 2014