Recently, reporters learned at the 2024 Autonomous Region Natural Resources Work and Party Conduct & Integrity Building Teleconference that in 2024, our region will accelerate the implementation of a new round of strategic actions to achieve breakthroughs in mineral exploration, stepping up efforts in the exploration and development of mineral resources. Throughout the year, the Autonomous Region Department of Natural Resources aims to grant more than 170 exploration rights, thereby significantly boosting revenue from such grants.
　　This year, our district’s natural resources system will focus on achieving breakthroughs in mineral exploration and introducing practical measures to ensure resource security, thereby supporting the construction of the nation’s strategic energy and resource security base and the autonomous region’s “Eight Major Industrial Clusters.”
　　This year, the Autonomous Region’s Department of Natural Resources aims to submit more than 70 prospective mineral exploration targets, 40 to 60 exploration blocks, and 20 to 30 identified mineral deposits. At the same time, it seeks to establish new large-scale resource bases and significantly increase reserves of a number of strategically critical and advantageous mineral resources, including iron, titanium, manganese, and lithium.
　　Sun Jizhou, Party Secretary and Deputy Director of the Autonomous Region’s Department of Natural Resources, said that the region’s natural resources system will accelerate the transfer of mineral resource rights, coordinate and leverage the roles of institutions such as the Geological Bureau and the Institute of Geology Research, encourage geological exploration units and enterprises to proactively submit applications, select high-quality blocks through multiple channels, and speed up the extension and commercialization of mineral exploration results. By focusing on attracting enterprises and boosting industries through targeted resource allocation, we will intensify the precise issuance of mining rights and work closely with the Ministry of Natural Resources to identify and prioritize more oil and gas blocks.
　　In promoting the green and high-quality development of the mining industry, this year our region will accelerate the introduction of several measures to drive high-quality mining development and create a favorable environment for exploration and development; we will also implement an action plan for the development of green mining industry clusters.
　　In addition, the special rectification campaign “Circle but Don’t Explore,” implemented system-wide, will reach its concluding phase this year. There are currently 985 exploration rights in the entire region that have not met the minimum exploration investment requirements. Building on last year’s completion of 636 such cases, the remaining 349 cases will be tackled and finalized in the first half of this year.
　　It is understood that in 2023, our region significantly strengthened its strategic capacity to ensure the supply of energy resources. Since the launch of the new round of strategic actions for breakthroughs in mineral exploration, more than 1,900 projects have been implemented, resulting in the establishment of seven large-scale resource bases, including a million-ton-level lithium deposit and a ten-million-ton-level fluorite deposit in the Altyn area, as well as the consolidation of five major resource bases, such as the million-ton-level rare-metal mine at Dahongliutan. Throughout the region, the natural resources system has granted exploration rights for 227 blocks, accounting for 40.2% of the national total. Revenue from these grants reached a record high, providing strong support for the development of the “Eight Major Industrial Clusters.”