A Utah delegation led by the Governor’s Office of Economic Development (GOED) and the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) completed a 10-day trade mission to Argentina, Aug. 10–20, advancing partnerships on critical minerals, energy, and saline lake research.
The mission comes as Utah works to reduce U.S. reliance on China, which refines most of the world’s critical minerals. Under the state’s “Mission Critical” initiative, Utah aims to help meet a quarter of the nation’s critical mineral demand and process half of what’s mined in-state — goals that depend on partners with the raw material to supply them. Argentina holds one of the largest known lithium reserves on the planet.
In Buenos Aires, the delegation met with Argentine officials to advance the “Framework Instrument for Securing Supply in the Mining and Processing of Critical Minerals,” signed earlier this year, which simplifies permitting and sets shared standards for responsible mining.
“We’re grateful Argentina’s leaders opened their doors to us in every province we visited, because that kind of relationship is what turns a framework agreement into trusted investment,” said Jefferson Moss, commissioner of GOED. “Utah came to Argentina to build the relationships that will better ensure both economies’ long-term success.”
In Catamarca and Jujuy, the delegation met provincial officials around the $1.2 billion expansion of the Cauchari-Olaroz lithium complex. Utah shared research on water-efficient direct lithium extraction, which Argentine researchers are now adapting for their own use. This work also contributes to Utah’s management of the Great Salt Lake.
The two states’ saline lakes are already linked in another way: the Wilson’s phalarope, a migratory shorebird that visits the Great Salt Lake every fall, flies nonstop from there to Mar Chiquita, a saline lake in Córdoba, of similar size and facing similar environmental challenges. The delegation toured Mar Chiquita’s wetlands and Ansenuza National Park to exchange conservation research.
The mission also included a meeting with Universidad Nacional de La Matanza to build academic ties around Utah’s mining engineering program, one of only 14 accredited programs of its kind nationally.
The trip lays the groundwork for future memoranda of understanding between Utah and Argentina’s provincial ministries.
Read more in this article by Deseret News.