China Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM)
Author of gallium/germanium/rare-earth export controls
China's Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM), with the General Administration of Customs, administers the export-control regime on critical minerals used in semiconductors. It imposed export licensing on gallium and germanium in 2023, expanded to antimony and graphite, tightened rare-earth and tungsten controls in 2024-2025, and in December 2024 banned outright exports of gallium, germanium and antimony to the United States in retaliation for US chip-tool controls. It is the primary state actor weaponizing upstream materials supply.
Instruments
Export licensing + outright bans
2023
Gallium/germanium licensing
Dec 2024
Ga/Ge/Sb export ban to the US
2024-25
Tightened rare-earth, tungsten, graphite controls
How it fits the stack
China Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) with what it depends on (above) and what it feeds (below). The figure renders as a crawlable diagram and upgrades to an interactive 3D graph as it scrolls into view.
China Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) in the AI stack. China Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) with its immediate upstream dependencies (top) and downstream dependents (bottom) in the AI value chain. Hover a node in 3D, or read the full relationships below.