Australia is estimated to have the world's largest gold reserves, with 9,500 tonnes or 17 per cent of the total world estimated gold reserves of 57,000 tonnes. Geoscience Australia estimates that 60 per cent of Australia's gold reserves are in Western Australia.
Gold production ranked by major countries 2021. In 2021, China's mines produced an estimated 370 metric tons of gold. China is the largest gold producer in the world.
Currently the second-largest gold-producing country in the world, Australia is home to top producers and gold mines. Read on for a breakdown of the Australian gold market, as well as the largest gold mines that can be found throughout the area.
Australia (especially Western Australia) is the one of the world's top producers of gold. About 60% of Australia's gold resources occur in Western Australia, with the remainder in all other States and the Northern Territory.
According to GlobalData, Australia held 18.9 per cent of global gold reserves in 2021, or more than 10,000 tonnes. The country is home to some of the world's largest gold mines and some of the world's largest gold producers are headquartered in Australia.
Demand for Australian gold was largely dominated by India and the United Kingdom in 2010, accounting for 36.8 per cent and 35.9 per cent of total gold exports respectively. India is a fast-growing market for Australian gold, as the country's increasing wealth means more Indians can afford gold jewellery.
Australia is one of the world's leading producers of bauxite (aluminium ore), iron ore, lithium, gold, lead, diamond, rare earth elements, uranium, and zinc. Australia also has large mineral sand deposits of ilmenite, zircon and rutile.
As the fourth largest mining country in the world (after China, the United States, and Russia), Australia will have ongoing demand for high-tech mining equipment, representing potential opportunities for U.S. suppliers.
In 2020 mineral exports contributed 62% of Australia's total export revenue, valued at $270 billion. Australia is the world's largest exporter of coal (35% of international trade), iron ore, lead, diamonds, rutile, zinc and zirconium, second largest of gold and uranium, and third largest of aluminium.
What Does Australia Export? Australia's main export is iron ore, followed by their other most valuables exports coal, gold, and petroleum. These exports alone rake in $48.2 billion, $47 billion, $29.1 billion, and $20.3 billion, respectively.
Australian Gold® Founder, Trevor Gray, was born and raised in a small town in Indiana, America. However, thanks to his mother's Australian heritage, he also felt a deep connection to there too. Trevor was raised by 3 Australian women, and had a strong bond with his mother's homeland and culture.
1. Australia – 10,000 tonnes. Australia is way out in front as the country with the largest gold mine reserves in the world at 10,000 tonnes.
In Australia this concentration of gold took place in the Earth hundreds of millions of years ago in the eastern states, and thousands of millions of years ago in Western Australia. As well as gold, the fluids can carry other dissolved minerals, such as quartz. This is why gold is often found with quartz.
New analysis shows Australia's mining industry is experiencing conditions like the boom of 2010, with record-breaking exploration spending and capital raising. Total exploration expenditure hit a record $974 million in the fourth quarter of 2021, almost double the exploration spending in the same period in 2020.
You may have noticed that Australia is amazingly flat. This means that over hundreds of millions of years, it has been eroded and the minerals that were in the hills and mountains were flushed into various deposits, now deep under overlying sediments.
Gold. Australia's abundance of gold resources makes our country a prominent focus in the world's growing demand.
Australia has been a diamond producer since the nineteenth century. The largest diamond found so far in Australia was mined at the Merlin Mine, Northern Territory, in 2003 and weighed 104.73 carats.
In 2021, the United States was estimated to have some 3,000 metric tons of gold reserves in mines. Thus, the U.S. was one of the leading countries based on mine reserves of gold. Australia is estimated to have the largest gold mine reserves worldwide.
Minerals are the property of the Crown. If you discover gold or other minerals or gemstones on land not covered by a mining tenement, and the ground is Crown land (under the Mining Act 1978), then you are free to keep what you have found (as long as you hold a Miner's Right).
Because of this, the amount of gold on earth is finite. While there is no way to know exactly how much gold remains to be mined, experts agree that there are few remaining, untouched gold deposits hidden in layers of rock. The world will run out of minable gold, though exactly when is unknown.