[Private event, by invitation only]
The United Nations Secretary-General’s Panel on Critical Energy Transition Minerals released its report, Resourcing the Energy Transition: Principles to guide critical energy transition minerals towards equity and justice, in September 2024. The report sets out seven Guiding Principles covering the whole critical energy transition minerals value chain, from human rights and environmental integrity to justice and equity, benefit-sharing and responsible investment, finance and trade. It also sets out five Actionable Recommendations to put these Principles into practice and to close gaps in international minerals governance. The Secretary-General endorsed the Panel's findings.
In October 2025, the Secretary-General endorsed the creation of the United Nations Task Force on Critical Energy Transition Minerals. The Task Force is composed of over 20 entities and co-chaired by UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), with the support of the Executive Office of the Secretary-General. It coordinates United Nations work to implement the Guiding Principles and Actionable Recommendations, with a focus on strengthening support for developing countries.
The Task Force works through five Technical Clusters, one for each Actionable Recommendation. Each Cluster produces analytical work and knowledge products and is supported by a voluntary Network of Experts drawn from governments, international organizations and non-State actors. Alongside the Clusters, the Country Support Mechanism, led by UNDP with the United Nations Development Coordination Office, is the Task Force's operational instrument for coordinated UN support at country level. Its first cohort of beneficiary countries is Guinea, Indonesia, Madagascar, Nigeria, Zambia and Zimbabwe.
Technical Cluster on Actionable Recommendation 1 (TC-AR1) Consultation on taxation and fiscal policy
Actionable Recommendation 1 calls for accelerating benefit-sharing, value addition and economic diversification in critical energy transition mineral value chains. Co-led by UNCTAD and the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), in collaboration with UNDP, TC-AR1 is holding a series of consultations with its Network of Experts. They cover four areas: value addition and economic diversification; trade; benefit-sharing; and enforcement of human rights, environmental, governance, social and climate safeguards. This consultation falls under the benefit-sharing area and focuses on taxation and fiscal policy.
Strong demand for critical minerals has not always brought matching gains in public revenue, industrial development, jobs or diversification for producing countries and their communities. Many fiscal frameworks are poorly suited to volatile prices, changing value chains and shifting rent dynamics. As a result, governments can struggle to secure a fair share of mineral rents, encourage domestic value addition and manage revenue volatility. They also lose public resources through unjustified tax incentives, illicit financial flows, tax avoidance and evasion, and abusive transfer pricing.
The consultation will bring experts together to identify practical, context-specific policy options. It will look at:
- fiscal regime reforms that raise revenue and reduce leakage.
- fiscal and tax instruments that support domestic processing, value addition and industrial upgrading.
- how to align fiscal, industrial and trade policies for structural transformation and a just transition.
- ways to capture windfall gains while remaining attractive to investors.
- good practices from country experience.
- how fiscal frameworks can support States' human rights obligations, transparency and meaningful participation of affected people and communities, including Indigenous Peoples, and how to address gender and distributional impacts.
Open remarks: Nicolas Maennling, UNIDO
Scene-setting: Rachid Amui, UNCTAD, and Igor Gryshko, OHCHR
Interactive debate moderated by Clovis Feire, UNCTAD
Closing remarks: Clovis Feire, UNCTAD
Technical Cluster on Actionable Recommendation 2 (TC-AR2) Midterm Consultation
Actionable Recommendation 2 calls for a multi-stakeholder expert process to develop a global traceability, transparency and accountability framework along the entire mineral value chain, from mining to recycling. The framework is meant to strengthen due diligence, support corporate accountability and build a global market for critical energy transition minerals, without being used as a unilateral trade barrier. TC-AR2 is co-led by UNCTAD and the United Nations Regional Commissions — Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Economic Commission for Europe (ECE), Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), and Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA).
TC-AR2 is running a phased consultation process:
- Global Consultations (May–June 2026) gave a first overview of what a global framework could involve.
- Ad hoc consultations with stakeholder groups (July–December 2026) allow more targeted discussion of specific issues.
- Thematic consultations and Regional Consultations are planned for 2027.
The Midterm Consultation offers a structured opportunity to take stock halfway through the process. The Co-Leads will present a synthesis of emerging findings, followed by an interactive dialogue in which experts will:
- validate and refine the findings
- identify where stakeholder views converge and diverge
- flag issues that remain unresolved or underexplored
- assess whether any stakeholder groups, regions or value-chain segments are under-represented
- set priorities for the rest of the consultation process
Participation
Private event, by invitation. The consultations will bring together experts from the Clusters' Networks, including nominated experts from governments, United Nations entities, international and regional organizations, industry associations, private sector actors, civil society organizations, Indigenous Peoples and other rights holders, academia, research institutions and technical standard-setting bodies. Participation will aim to ensure balanced geographical representation and broad coverage of stakeholder perspectives across critical energy transition mineral value chains.
