Critical Minerals Supply Risk
Governments are spending billions to secure critical minerals. The minerals themselves come from places where a road, a permit or a protest can stop production in a week. This is where Region Alert covers that ground.
Region Alert publishes ground-level briefs on the producing regions behind minerals on the USGS critical minerals list. We cover cobalt and copper in the Democratic Republic of Congo, gold in Mali and across West Africa, and lithium in Nigeria. Every brief is built from local-language collection inside the country, and every entry carries the operational consequence.
Live coverage
Kolwezi Cobalt Tracker
The DRC supplies roughly three quarters of world cobalt and Kolwezi is the centre of it. Security in the city, the 10 percent local ownership deadline, regulator inspections, and the Kasumbalesa and Lobito corridors. Weekly.
Elevated Open →Mali Gold Belt Tracker
A mine shut and stripped of its environmental permits, 850 fuel tankers under military escort, and the 2023 mining code rolling out through community development committees. Daily.
Elevated Open →West Africa Mining Weekly
Mali, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Nigeria and Cote d'Ivoire. State takeovers of gold assets, the Ghana 30 percent purchase mandate, galamsey and flooding, and the Sahel security picture. Weekly.
High Open →Project Vault
What the $12 billion US Strategic Critical Minerals Reserve is, which minerals it covers, who runs it, and the ground conditions at the assets its material comes from.
Reference Open →What we measure on every asset
Critical minerals supply chain risk is not one number. On every region we cover, four things decide whether production reaches a buyer, and each one fails differently.
| Layer | What we track | How it shows up |
|---|---|---|
| Security | Incidents around the site and in the town the workforce lives in, mapped to district and locality | Shift attendance drops, contractor movement stops, night logistics halt |
| Regulation | Permits, ownership rules, export mandates, inspections, licence reviews | Structural change on a fixed deadline, often with days of notice |
| Corridors | Roads, borders, rail and ports the material moves through | Queues, closures, fatal accidents, congestion at the export point |
| Community | Resettlement, compensation, land disputes, artisanal mining interfaces | Blockades, protests at the gate, escalation to national politics |
Why ground conditions decide supply
Three examples from Region Alert briefs published between 9 July and 3 August 2026. None was visible in a price screen on the day it happened.
| What happened | Where and when | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| A mining code provision written in 2018 was enforced with nine days' notice, requiring every company to cede 10 percent of capital | DR Congo, 22 July 2026 | Every foreign-backed Copperbelt operator had a structural equity change to execute on a fixed date |
| A government closed a gold mine and withdrew its environmental permits | Mali, 29 July 2026 | Environmental compliance became an enforcement lever for every operator in the country |
| A state created a fully state-owned mining company and funded the restart of two mines | Burkina Faso, 9 July 2026 | Resource nationalism moved from forecast to schedule across the region |
Who uses this
Mine operators and security teams
District-level incident detail around your site, corridor status, and the community grievances that turn into blockades.
Commodity buyers and traders
What is happening at origin before it reaches price, from permit actions to road closures to export policy.
Insurers and financiers
Evidence for country risk and political risk positions, dated and tied to named locations.
Compliance and ESG teams
Community consent, resettlement disputes, artisanal mining interfaces and environmental enforcement.
Frequently asked questions
What does Region Alert cover in critical minerals?
Region Alert publishes ground-level briefs on producing regions behind minerals on the USGS critical minerals list. That currently includes cobalt and copper in the Democratic Republic of Congo, gold in Mali and across West Africa, and lithium in Nigeria. Each brief is built from local-language collection inside the country.
How is this different from a commodity price service?
Price services tell you what a mineral costs. Region Alert tells you what is happening where it is produced: which road closed, which permit was pulled, which community is mobilising, which border is slow. Those events move supply before they move price.
How often are these briefs published?
Cadence depends on the asset. The Copperbelt brief is weekly and the Mali gold brief is daily. The West Africa mining brief is weekly across five countries. The public pages on this site show the most recent published edition with its date, so you can always see how current an assessment is.
What is the critical minerals supply chain risk you actually measure?
Four things, on every asset we cover. Security around the site and the town your workforce lives in. Regulation, including permits, ownership rules and export mandates. Corridors, meaning the roads, borders, rail and ports the material moves through. And community consent, meaning resettlement, compensation and artisanal mining interfaces. Those four decide whether production reaches a buyer.
Do you publish your sources?
No. Region Alert assessments are produced by our intelligence team from ground-level, local-language collection. Source identities and collection methodology are proprietary and are not published. Our editorial principles, confidence ratings and corrections policy are published.
Can you cover an asset you do not currently brief?
Usually yes. Most of our briefs began as a specific customer requirement for a named site or corridor. Tell us the asset and the decisions it feeds and we will tell you whether we can build it and how long it takes.
Tell us which asset matters
Most of our briefs started as one customer asking about one site. Name the asset or corridor and the decisions it feeds, and we will tell you what we can cover and how quickly.
Request a field brief See mining security servicesSourcing. Region Alert assessments are produced by our intelligence team from ground-level, local-language collection in the countries we cover. Source identities and collection methodology are proprietary and are not published. Editorial principles and our corrections policy are at editorial standards.