Dr. Elena Safirova is an economist at the National Minerals Information Center within the United States Geological Survey. She is the country specialist for Russia, Uzbekistan, Ukraine, Belarus, and the three countries in the South Caucasus Region—Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. She has been a country specialist since 2011 and authors country chapters for the annually published USGS Minerals Yearbook. She is also the lead author of USGS Open File Report “Estimates of Immediate Effects on World Markets of a Hypothetical Disruption to Russia’s Supply of Six Mineral Commodities.” Recently, Safirova participated in a United States State Department-funded project on critical minerals in Uzbekistan that resulted in a publication titled “Analysis of the potential Effects of Uzbekistan’s Mineral Endowment on the Critical Mineral Supply of Tungsten.” Prior to joining the USGS, Elena spent a decade as an Economics researcher at Resources for the Future, an environmental think-tank in Washington, DC where she focused on spatial and transportation economics and policy. She holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the State University of New York at Buffalo and a Diploma in Economics from Moscow State University, Russia.
Critical Minerals in Central Asia and the South Caucasus Regions—Challenges and Opportunities
In recent years, technological advances created demand for a wide range of mineral commodities, especially many minor metals and rare earth elements. At the same time, several factors such as high production concentration, geopolitical threats and uneven distribution of mineral reserves make supply of such commodities both limited and uncertain. To address this uncertainty, many countries and supranational entities developed their own lists of critical and strategic minerals. For example, the United States published its first critical minerals list in 2018 and then, after refining the methodology, published two revised versions in 2022 and 2025. The European Union published its first list of critical raw materials in 2011 and since then produced several revisions; the fifth version was published in 2023. The developed counties continue working on programs and plans aimed at locating reliable sources of critical minerals to supply their industries. The strategies include promoting domestic development of mineral resources, which is likely to be limited, at least in the short run, forming strategic alliances with other developed countries and, most importantly, cooperating with the countries where critical minerals can be produced in the short to medium run.
In this presentation, we will look at the current mineral production and mineral endowment of the countries in Central Asia and the South Caucasus, with an emphasis on critical and strategic minerals, as defined by the developed countries. We will describe the current state of cooperation on critical minerals and outline the potential benefits for the region.
