Countries are lining up to reach agreements with Central Asian states for access to the region’s abundant critical minerals. The minerals are there, and continued surveying turns up new deposits all the time. 

One of the problems for the Central Asian countries most often cited is that they do not have the facilities to process these minerals at home, and it could be years before such facilities are constructed.

Certainly, the planned scale of production requires construction of possibly a dozen or more new processing plants, but some Central Asian countries already do have such facilities.

Already exporting

The Ulba Metallurgical Plant is located in Oskemen (formerly Ust-Kamenogorsk), in the East Kazakhstan Province. The plant is connected to uranium. It opened in 1949, just a few weeks after the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb in the Semei (formerly Semipalatinsk) region, a little more than 200 kilometres from Oskemen. 

The Ulba plant is now operated by state company Kazatomprom and the China General Nuclear Power Corporation. In 2024, the plant reached capacity for producing low-enriched uranium fuel assemblies, 200 tonnes, enough for six reactors.

Ulba produces more nuclear fuel than just the fuel assemblies that went to China. Kazakhstan has been the leading producer of uranium in the world since 2009, and now ships uranium to countries in Europe, Asia, and to the United States. 

But the Ulba plant produces more than uranium. The Kazatomprom website says Ulba also turns out “products containing beryllium, tantalum and niobium…”

Uzbekistan’s Navoi Mining & Metallurgical Combine (NMMC) has mainly focused on gold production since opening in 1958. The plant also produced uranium.

As part of a reorganisation at NMMC, Navoiyuran was established and started an operation to extract rare earths from uranium deposits in January 2022. Those rare earths include vanadium, rhenium, and copper, as well as uranium.

Uzbekistan is the sixth largest producer of uranium. Navoiyuran’s sales in 2025 amounted to some $1.1bn, largely due to a 35% increase in uranium.

Coming soon?

In Kyrgyzstan, the Kadamzhai Antimony Plant in the south of the country launched in 1936 and was a leading producer of antimony during the Soviet era. 

Since Kyrgyzstan became independent in late 1991, operations at the Kadamzhai plant have limped along. Recent increased global interest in securing supplies of critical minerals have led several countries to take a closer look at the Kadamzhai plant. 

In 2022, Turkish investors said they could invest up to $50mn in the Kadamzhai plant and nearby Khaidarkan Mercury Plant, but later faced problems and abandoned the project. 

Russian company Voyager has 30 years of involvement in Kadamzhai and in August 2025 expressed interest in leasing the facility. Voyager is currently upgrading the plant and plans to relaunch operations.

China already accounts for 60-70% of the global mining and processing of antimony. That has not stopped Chinese investors from inquiring about Kadamzhai. 

In neighbouring Tajikistan, where the world’s second largest reserves of antimony are located, Chinese investors are already involved in at least two large-scale mining operations (Zeravshan-Hissar and Sughd).

Almost all the antimony mined in Tajikistan is sent to China for processing, something Kyrgyzstan hopes to avoid. 

The Kara-Balta Ore Mining Combine, some 60 kilometres from the capital Bishkek, was built in 1955 to process uranium. 

Since independence, Kyrgyz authorities have generally welcomed gold mining, but Kyrgyzstan is still trying to clean up the Soviet-era uranium tailings in the area near the town of Maily-Suu and was extremely reluctant to sign deals for mining uranium and other minerals.

In 2016, the plant stopped uranium operations, the Times of Central Asia reported. In 2019, Kyrgyz authorities placed moratoria on development of uranium and thorium deposits, and by 2022, the Kara-Balta plant was declared bankrupt .

With increasing global interest in critical minerals, Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov signed legislation in June 2024 that lifted the moratorium and work has already restarted at the Kyzyl-Ompol uranium and thorium deposits in northeast Kyrgyzstan.

Not long after, state gold company Kyrgyzaltyn acquired all the assets of the Kara-Balta plant, naming its new subsidiary Karabalta Mining Company LLC.

The company’s website says a modernisation of the plant is coming with the expectation it will process “uranium, non-ferrous, rare-earth metals, and other valuable minerals.” 

Not enough, but a start

Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan have opened their countries to investment in critical minerals mining but both countries want to sell processed materials, not raw ore.

Kazakh and Uzbek authorities have made clear that foreign investors should be prepared to help build the facilities needed to process the minerals in Kazakhstan or Uzbekistan.

Germany’s HMG Bergbau, for example, is investing up to $700mn to build a lithium mining and processing plant at a site in Ulan, East Kazakhstan Province . 

However, if the need for critical minerals is urgent, there are Soviet-era options that are already operating, or simply in need of modernisation and upgrades.

The Ulba Metallurgical plant is proof that investment in refurbishment can result in production of materials suited for modern use. Uzbekistan’s NMMC subsidiary Navoiyuran is another example.

Countries seeking large amounts of critical minerals from Central Asia will have to wait for a while, but deliveries is small quantities are already being made and, in Kyrgyzstan’s case, these deliveries could easily be increased.