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Australia’s iron ore golden age ‘well and truly over’ as nation falls behind in ‘green steel’ race

Issued at 2024-08-26



Australia’s iron ore golden age is well and truly over. A new age is dawning – but it looks like the country may have already missed the boat.

Australia’s prosperous Iron Age is well and truly over. A new age is dawning – but will it be an economic Stone Age?

The “dig it and ship it” economics of Australia’s iron ore industry has been political cocaine in Canberra’s halls of power for well over two decades.

Tidal surges in export revenue saved national budgets and, therefore, governments.

When those profits ebbed, so did political fortunes.

But just as Colonial Australia’s gold and copper booms came to crunching ends in the late 1800s, the age of iron-driven economics is ending. Fast.

China’s economic woes are an obvious cause.

It imported 84 per cent of Australia’s almost 900 million tonnes of production in 2022.

And iron ore alone accounts for about one-fifth of Canberra’s export revenues ($133 billion in 2022).

But the industry was already staring down an existential crisis.


Source: news.com.au



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