Caribbean Economic Alchemy: Has Magic Returned to Bauxite?

Date
Jan 2015
After a long period of stagnating prices, the global bauxite market is experiencing changes which are expected to drive prices higher. To a large extent, these changes are driven by increasing demand from Chinese manufacturing. However, constraints on exports imposed by major bauxite producers, such as Indonesia and India have affected the supply side as well, and represent an opportunity for Caribbean bauxite exporters to increase their share of a growing market. This Policy Brief provides an overview of the aforementioned changes in market conditions and proposes a new approach to organizing bauxite mining for the Caribbean bauxite exporters.