Welcome to r/science! This is a heavily moderated subreddit in order to keep the discussion on science. However, we recognize that many people want to discuss how they feel the research relates to their own personal lives, so to give people a space to do that, personal anecdotes are allowed as responses to this comment. Any anecdotal comments elsewhere in the discussion will be removed and our normal comment rules apply to all other comments.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[removed]

Vanadium. Sounds like that’s available on every street corner. I wonder which underdeveloped nation gets to be the victim, uh… supplier, of a rare earth element.

China, Russia and South Africa mine out the most. Mostly China. It's the 20th most abundant element in Earth's crust.

Thanks for providing this. Given the relationship the west has with China and Russia, let’s hope South Africa has enough for everyone else.

[removed]

Not when china is robbing africa of its resources.

[removed]