The European Commission has launched a comprehensive strategy aimed at strengthening the EU’s economic security and reducing reliance on external sources for critical raw materials. The initiative, known as ResourceEU, builds upon the 2023 Critical Raw Materials Act and outlines a coordinated approach to safeguard supply chains essential for industries such as electric vehicles, aerospace, defense, and artificial intelligence hardware.
Key components include establishing a European Critical Raw Materials Center to diversify sourcing, creating a joint procurement platform to aggregate demand and secure long-term supply agreements, and implementing a unified stockpiling system across member states. The plan also aims to accelerate project permitting and reduce investment risks, with the goal of cutting import dependencies by up to 50 percent by 2029.
To support near-term alternatives, €3 billion ($3.5 billion) in EU funding will be allocated over the next year to fast-track viable projects. The strategy further emphasizes international cooperation, expanding on 15 existing partnerships with resource-rich nations and developing new investment frameworks with like-minded countries.
Stéphane Séjourné, Executive Vice President for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy, stressed the need for Europe to adapt to a more unpredictable global environment, stating that economic resilience should not hinge on any single geopolitical scenario. Maroš Šefčovič, Commissioner for Trade and Economic Security, emphasized that openness in trade must be balanced with strategic safeguards to prevent vulnerabilities. Kaja Kallas, High Representative for Foreign Affairs, underscored the physical risks posed by overdependence on critical materials, particularly for defense applications.
Implementation will involve reviewing current tools such as the Dual-Use Export Control Regulation and leveraging the Foreign Subsidies Regulation to ensure fair competition. New initiatives include a pilot program to monitor startups in sensitive tech fields and incentives under upcoming legislation like Chips Act 2.0 and the Quantum Act to reduce strategic dependencies.
The Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) acknowledged the importance of recycling in securing industrial supply chains but warned that certain proposed measures—such as export restrictions on scrap magnets, aluminum, and potentially copper—could distort global markets. The organization urged the EU to base policy decisions on transparent data and global impact assessments, cautioning that overly restrictive trade actions might undermine the very resilience they aim to protect. Alev Somer, BIR’s trade and environment director, emphasized that competitive international markets for recycled materials are essential for global resource efficiency and emissions reduction.
The BIR reaffirmed its willingness to collaborate with EU institutions to ensure that economic security efforts support, rather than hinder, the global circular economy.
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EU introduces measures to secure raw materials, strengthen economic security
The European Commission has presented new initiatives it says will strengthen the EU ‘s economic security and boost competitiveness. However, the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) says the measures could create adverse market distortions for the recycling industry.
The initiatives
On Dec. 2, the EC and the High Representative presented a Joint Communication on strengthening Economic Security. According to the Commission, this new approach, which builds on the Economic Security Strategy of 2023, outlines concrete steps to make the EU stronger and more resilient in the face of growing external economic threats while remaining open and committed to international trade and investment.
The proposal outlines a number of key actions:
establishing a more proactive and targeted approach focusing on six priority high-risk areas;
coordinated and strategic use of tools to improve EU action;
improved risk assessment and information gathering and sharing to ensure timely and effective intervention;
completing the EU ‘s economic security toolbox with new tools to address the current gaps, such as ResourceEU; and
international cooperation with trusted partners, promoting common economic security standards and addressing key challenges together.
The ResourceEU action plan referenced in the Joint Communication on strengthening Economic Security builds on the Critical Raw Materials Act and aims to accelerate and amplify the efforts to secure the EU ‘s supply of critical raw materials for key industrial sectors and protect EU value chains from supply disruptions. This includes sectors such as automotive, industrial motors, defense, aerospace, artificial intelligence chips and data centers.
According to the Commission, the ResourceEU action plan would protect European industry from geopolitical and price shocks by setting up a European Critical Raw Materials Center to diversify and strengthen the supply chains, using the Raw Materials Platform to aggregate demand, jointly purchase strategic raw materials and secure offtake agreements, and developing a coordinated EU approach to stockpiling critical raw materials. It also would promote critical raw materials projects by derisking investments and fast-tracking permitting, which can reduce dependencies by up to 50 percent by 2029.
Over the next 12 months, 3 billion euros ($3.5 billion) in EU funds will support projects that can provide alternative supplies in the short term. Finally, the ResourceEU action plan would see the EU partner with like-minded countries to strengthen and diversify supply chains, building on the existing 15 strategic partnerships with resource-rich countries while also working on new investment frameworks.
“In a more volatile and unpredictable world, Europe must update its strategic reflexes and prepare for every possible scenario,” says Stéphane Séjourné, the European Commission executive vice president for Prosperity and Industrial Strategy. “Our ability to safeguard the resilience of our economy cannot depend on any single geopolitical configuration. With the launch of the ResourceEU program, this new doctrine is not just a vision for the future—it is already operational. We are equipping the Union with the tools it needs to remain strong, adaptable, and sovereign in the face of global uncertainty.”
Maroš Šefčovič, commissioner for Trade and Economic Security and Interinstitutional Relations and Transparency, says, “Europe remains a champion of open trade and global investment, but openness without security becomes vulnerability. To stay resilient in a shifting geopolitical and geoeconomic landscape, we must use our tools more strategically and assertively while developing new ones to reinforce our economic security. And we must strengthen our capacity to gather and share economic intelligence, because true security is only possible when Europe acts as one—with member states and industry moving in sync.”
“Economic security is fundamental to Europe’s security,” says Kaja Kallas, high representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and vice president of the European Commission. “When access to the critical raw materials we need for our defense is cut off, over-dependencies become physically dangerous. Today, we adopt a new strategy to reduce these dependencies by diversifying our supply chains while remaining open to trade with partners. Effectively using the EU’s full trade arsenal to respond to economic threats is a core element of this strategy. And smarter choices, from a more strategic use of EU funding to increased intelligence sharing, can help make the Union more secure.”
What’s next?
To implement the EU’s new Economic Security approach, the Commission will adapt how it uses the EU’s existing tools and develop new tools to address the current gaps in the EU’s economic security.
Measures will include evaluating in the coming year its Dual-Use Export Control Regulation to see if it is well-adapted to its aims and can keep pace with the latest geopolitical developments; considering economic security implications in relevant trade defense investigations and in the design of measures; and using the Foreign Subsidies Regulation and other competition tools to preserve fair competition, especially where unfair competition is identified as a source of a dependency which threatens the EU’s economic security.
New tools will be created, such as launching a pilot project to monitor startups in critical technology areas, aimed at identifying those that are vulnerable to hostile foreign acquisitions and offering them support; and incentivizing companies to reduce dependencies in emerging technology areas as part of the upcoming Chips Act 2.0, Quantum Act, Cloud and AI Development Act and Commission Strategy on Open Source.
The BIR responds
Brussels-based BIR says that while the newly published Economic Security Doctrine and the ResourceEU Action Plan confirm the central role of recycling and secondary raw materials in securing Europe’s industrial future, several measures risk undermining the resilience and competitiveness the EU seeks to protect.
The Action Plan includes many initiatives the organization says would affect international recyclers:
restricting exports of scrap and waste of permanent magnets, targeted measures on aluminum scrap and potentially similar steps for copper, depending on market monitoring, by early 2026;
expanding EU product requirements and labeling rules for permanent magnets, including declarations of recycled content and measures encouraging recovery of preconsumer waste;
strengthening the focus on critical raw materials (CRM) waste shipment facilitation within the EU, aligned with the Waste Shipment Regulation;
creating a European Critical Raw Materials Center and the launch of a coordinated EU stockpiling scheme in early 2026; and
Introducing measures to boost collection under the revision of the WEEE Directive, improving access to CRM-containing end-of-life products.
The Economic Security Doctrine complements this by signaling future adjustments to the EU’s trade, industrial and investment-screening toolkit, the BIR notes, with a 2026 assessment of whether new instruments are needed to respond to “unfair trade practices and global market distortions.”
The BIR says trade-restrictive approaches need to be grounded in transparent data, proportionality and a clear assessment of global market impacts.
The organization calls for transparent, proportional, data-driven policy design based on real-world trade flows and a balanced understanding of the international recycling market. “Export-restrictive measures designed without rigorous global impact assessments can distort markets, reduce competition and disrupt international circular-trade flows. For efficient resource use and emissions reductions worldwide, it is key to preserve the openness of global circular-economy trade and promote investments in positive incentives while avoiding counterproductive effects of restrictive trade measures,” the BIR says.
“To secure Europe ‘s industrial future and resilience, the continent needs competitive, well-functioning international markets for recycled materials,” says Alev Somer, BIR trade and environment director. “We fully support the EU’s ambition to expand recycling capacity, but this success depends entirely on evidence-based policies and predictable trade frameworks. Measures that hinder open trade, particularly those designed without rigorous global impact assessments, risk being entirely counterproductive.”
The BIR says it remains committed to collaborating with the European Commission and EU member states to ensure that Europe’s pursuit of economic security and raw-materials resilience strengthens rather than undermines global circularity.