80 critically due to the external and internal risks described. It is for this reason, among others, that the European Commission has classified graphite as a critical raw material. Table 3 shows that 57.99% of global graphite resources are located in areas with Neoproterozoic sedimentary sequences. With a further restriction to areas located in politically stable countries with sufficient democratic conditions and adequate environmental protection, only 3.8 Mio t remain in three European countries only (Austria, Czech Rep., Germany). External risks, which are beyond the consumer's control, are more difficult to manage than internal risks ("obstacles"), which potential consumers can address proactively. Graphite consumers would be well advised to diversify their sources of supply and also to develop own graphite resources (backward integration). There are a number of promising areas, particularly in known metallogenic districts, including those in politically stable countries. Within such areas, the probability of discovering new deposits is greater than outside of them. REFERENCES Barghamadi, M., et al. (2025): Australian graphite: A path to a global battery market opportunity. EP2025-1656 Block, S., Emerson, J. W., Esty, D. C., de Sherbinin, A., Wendling, Z. A., et al. (2024). 2024 Environmental Performance Index. New Haven, CT: Yale Center for Environmental Law & Policy. epi.yale.edu Summerfield, D., 2019. Australian Resource Reviews: Graphite 2018. Geoscience Australia, Canberra. U.S. Geological Survey (2025): Mineral commodity summaries 2025 (ver. 1.2, March 2025): U.S. Geological Survey, 212 p., https://doi.org/10.3133/mcs2025. Weber, L. (2023): On the security of graphite supply.- Mineralogy and Petrology; https://doi.org/10.1007/s00710-023-00816-3 Internet queries (per 09.04.2026) https://www.worldbank.org/en/publication/worldwide-governance-indicators https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20251021-211801/grapher/world-bank-incomegroups.html https://www.demokratiematrix.de/ https://unstats.un.org/unsd/methodology/m49/ https://unctad.org/topic/least-developed-countries/list https://unctadstat.unctad.org/EN/Classifications.html https://www.world-mining-data.info/
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