First of all, we have these minerals. That's better than the United States. The North American Lithium Mine, which is up for sale right now, has drawn interest from two U.S. groups, one of which is funded by U.S. defence. Why are they interested? The Americans need both lithium and graphite for weaponry, and they don't have any in their country.
Owning assets is important. We are lucky, we have the resources. We have them in Ontario and Quebec and in a few spots in the Maritimes. We have graphite and cobalt, among others. We have them, so let's keep them. We have what it takes to do the first two levels of processing and we're smart enough to do it. This is not the 1910s, this is the 2020s. We have universities, scientists and everything we need. They are going to be developed elsewhere. So why not develop them here? We just need to get support.
We're bidding today to acquire the lithium mine and we're competing with the Chinese, the Australians and the Americans. They're extremely aggressive when they come in to get resources. However, again, if we let it all go, we are going to be buying electric cars from China, and phones from Korea, and we'll have to find something else to do.