Iron ore is Australia's top export. Australia produces low cost, high grade iron ore with our biggest iron ore deposits located in Western Australia.
Today, Australia is one of the world's largest producers of several important ores and minerals, particularly iron ore, bauxite, uranium, lead, zinc and cobalt.
Uranium. Australia has the world's largest endowment of uranium resources in the world, with around one-third of global resources.
Exports The top exports of Australia are Iron Ore ($118B), Coal Briquettes ($54.3B), Petroleum Gas ($39.2B), Gold ($17.6B), and Wheat ($7.36B), exporting mostly to China ($138B), Japan ($47B), South Korea ($29.4B), India ($20.5B), and Chinese Taipei ($13.2B).
Opal – Australia is the world's largest producer of opal, being responsible for 95% of production.
Australia is the world's largest producer of lithium and a global top five producer of gold, iron ore, lead, zinc, and nickel.
Australia: A leading destination for critical minerals
world's number 1 producer of lithium (49%) and rutile (titanium) (26%) 2nd largest producer of zircon (zirconium) (21%) top 5 producer of cobalt, manganese, antimony and rare earth minerals.
Exporters and Importers
Mineral Products are the world's 2nd most traded product. In 2021, the top exporters of Mineral Products were Russia ($267B), United States ($256B), Australia ($232B), Saudi Arabia ($181B), and Canada ($136B).
What Does Australia Export? Australia's main export is iron ore, followed by their other most valuables exports coal, gold, and petroleum.
Australia has plentiful supplies of natural resources, including the second largest accessible reserves of iron ore in the world, the fifth largest reserves of coal and significant gas resources.
Australia has abundant reserves of critical minerals such as lithium, silicon and rare earths, which are key components of low-emissions technologies such as batteries, solar panels and electric vehicles which will help Australia and the world to lower emissions.
Australia is among the top five producers of most of the world's key mineral commodities, being: the world's leading producer of bauxite, alumina, rutile and tantalum. the second largest producer of uranium, lead, ilmenite, zircon and lithium.
1. Rhodium. Rhodium is a rare, silvery-white metal that belongs to the platinum group of elements.
Australia is a highly developed country with a mixed economy. As of 2023, Australia was the 13th-largest national economy by nominal GDP (gross domestic product), the 19th-largest by PPP-adjusted GDP, and was the 20th-largest goods exporter and 24th-largest goods importer.
China. Unsurprisingly, China has the highest reserves of rare earth minerals at 44 million MT. The country was also the world's leading rare earths producer in 2022 by a long shot, putting out 210,000 MT.
Australia's second-largest export sector, services, accounts for nearly three quarters of our economy and more than four out of five Australian jobs.
Australia is an important source of export cereals, meat, sugar, dairy produce, and fruit. Landholdings are characteristically large, specialized, owner-operated, capital-intensive, export-oriented, and intricately interlinked through the activities of producers' associations and government organizations.
For iron ore, it remained the largest supplier for China even when relations soured. In 2022, China bought 1.1 billion tonnes of iron ore, 65% of which were from Australia. For Beijing, commodities from Australia are important for its efforts to revive the pandemic-hit economy.
Iron ore industry in Australia
The production of iron ore in Australia has steadily increased over the years. Iron ore production across the country stood at around 922 million metric tons in 2021.
Australia is considered to have the largest reserves of recoverable uranium in the world.
JP Casey. Australia boasts some of the world's largest mineral deposits, including 21.9 billion tonnes of iron ore and 3,550 tonnes of gold, stretched over one of the largest and most sparsely populated islands in the world.