MANILA – US Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and Environment Jose Fernandez stated that the United States assured the Philippines of its “unwavering” support for Manila’s economic resilience and supply chain diversification.
Fernandez recently embarked on a 10-day trip to Viet Nam, the Philippines, and South Korea to discuss ways to strengthen US’ economic cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region.
“In the Philippines we assured our partners of our unwavering support for the Philippines’ economic resilience and supply chain diversification,” Fernandez said on Thursday in an online briefing.
“We also focused on expanding our already strong trade relations and investment opportunities in many areas. And one new area that we spent some time on is on critical nickels,” he said.
“The Philippines is interested in exploring opportunities in the critical mineral sector,” Fernandez said.
He added, “One of the things that we talked about is how we establish a closer, working relationship with the mineral security partnership in order to allow potential projects in the Philippines not just in nickel but in cobalt and in copper [as well].”
When asked whether the US is interested to forge a critical minerals agreement with the Philippines similar to what it entered into with Japan, Fernandez said, “We did not talk about a critical minerals agreement,”
But the US official said he had long discussions on critical minerals with concerned sectors in the Philippines.
“The Philippines is, after Indonesia, has the largest reserves of nickel in the world. And that’s an opportunity. It also matches what we have been trying to do,” he said.
“It’s part of diversifying our supply chains. One of those instruments is the mineral security partnership that I have spent a lot of time working on,” Fernandez said. This is made up of 13 countries plus the European Union, he said.
“It’s an agreement for all of us to work together, to share information about projects, share investment opportunities, financing opportunities, work on recycling and to do all of these by following the highest environmental, social and governance principles,” he said.
“That’s an opportunity and I discussed that with my colleagues and several ministries in the Philippines,” Fernandez said.
