In Belarus, the presence of rare earth metals in the bowels of the country was reported

In Belarus there are a number of rare earth metals that were identified back in Soviet times. This was announced by Vasily Kolb, Deputy General Director of the Research and Production Center for Geology.

According to him, there are more than 60 rare earth metals in the world today that meet the needs of the global economy, primarily in industry.

"First of all, it is aircraft construction, spacecraft, today the topic of UAVs, mechanical engineering, chemical industry is very developed. That is, there are quite a lot of areas where they can be applied today. And this is really appreciated in the world, and not every country can boast of having it," he said.

Kolb noted that metals such as molybdenum and thulium have been identified in Belarus, but they lie quite deep — 200-250 meters. In this regard, it is premature to talk about their extraction, and experts are still studying this possibility in detail.

"In order to get to production, we must carry out a complex of geological exploration works. We will determine the depths, specific occurrences, calculate resources and reserves. And the most important thing is to decide on the technology of extracting these elements," Kolb explained.

In addition, he noted that Belarus does not have such experience and competencies, so it will be necessary to study world technologies and turn to specialized specialists in Russia.

"Then we will look economically: is it generally cost-effective, is it advisable to continue carrying out detailed work. And then we can talk about extraction issues, about production issues," said the deputy director of the NPC for geology.

Earlier, President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko set the task for Deputy Prime Minister Yuri Shuleiko and newly appointed Minister of Nature Sergei Maslyak to search for rare earth resources in the country. In his opinion, geological exploration is not sufficiently developed in the republic, and they are not engaged in the search for rare earth metals at all. The next day, the Ministry of Natural Resources of Belarus reported that they had begun to carry out Lukashenko's instructions.