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Minerals: Imports

Asked by James McMurdockIndependentDepartment for Business and TradeTabled Answered 13 July 2026UIN 15894

The question

To ask the Secretary of State for Business and Trade, what estimate he has made of the value of critical mineral imports into the United Kingdom in each of the last five years.

Answered by Chris McDonald

As set out in the Technical Annex, “critical minerals” are imported into the UK in various forms:

  • raw critical minerals, such as ores and concentrates
  • chemicals, such as oxides, hydroxides and dioxides
  • intermediate products, such as bars, rods, profiles and alloys
  • waste and scrap, from which secondary supply can be salvaged and reintroduced to the production process via the circular economy

Under this definition, and according to HMRC’s Import data by preference, the UK imported the following values of critical minerals:

2022: £13.0 billion

2023: £11.3 billion

2024: £10.4 billion

2025: £11.3 billion

Due to changes in post-EU Exit customs, comparable trade data is only available from 1st January 2022.

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