New Delhi, Oct. 23 -- China's ongoing export controls on rare earth materials are a strategic move to exert influence over high-end defense manufacturing worldwide, highlighting the deep global dependence on Beijing for critical minerals.

"Basically everyone is dependent on China for a standing army because of the wide use of these minerals in defence, and we are days if not weeks away from a crisis," said Neha Mukherjee, Research Manager at Benchmark Mineral Intelligence (a London based data and supply chain intelligence platform for rare earth elements), in an exclusive interaction with, ANI.

Mukherjee explained that although the technology for extracting heavy rare earths is similar to that for light rare earths, the ripple effect is...