Geoscience Australia provides information on the nation's future capacity to produce mineral resources. Australia's Identified Mineral Resources is an annual nation-wide assessment of Australia's ore reserves and mineral resources. All major and a number of minor mineral commodities mined in Australia are assessed. It includes international rankings, summaries of significant exploration results, brief reviews of mining industry developments, and an analysis of mineral exploration expenditure across the States and Northern Territory. AIMR provides governments, industry, the investment sector and general community with an informed understanding of Australia's known mineral endowment and level of exploration activity. An important objective is to monitor whether resources are being discovered and developed for production at rates sufficient to maintain Australia's position as a major supplier of mineral commodities.
Australia's economic demonstrated resources (EDR) for the following 18 mineral commodities increased during 2007 - antimony, bauxite, cobalt, copper, gold, iron ore, manganese ore, ilmenite, rutile, zircon, molybdenum, nickel, rare earths, silver, tungsten, uranium, vanadium and zinc. In the same period, EDR of eight commodities - black coal, cadmium, diamonds (gem and industrial), lead, niobium, phosphate rock, platinum group metals and tantalum decreased. EDR for brown coal, lithium, magnesite, shale oil and tin remained at levels similar to those reported in 2006.
Increases in EDR were due to on-going drilling and evaluation of known deposits resulting in the transfer (re-assessment) of resources from inferred or sub-economic categories into EDR and the discovery of new deposits or extensions of known deposits. Sustained increases in prices for most metal and mineral commodities over recent years has allowed companies to re-assess the economic viability of lower grade resources and deposits which previously were considered to be uneconomic. Overall this has contributed to an increase in EDR for many metal and mineral commodities.
