ABSTRACT
In this chapter, we survey the economic potential of coastal and marine nonfuel minerals in the East and South China seas. We describe briefly the mineral economies for eight China Sea countries and review historic and current efforts in exploration, development, and production of coastal and marine nonfuel minerals. The benefits of CCOP, an international joint prospecting organization, are described. Using 1984 data based upon production of marine sand and gravel in Kyushu, Japan, marine tin production in Indonesia, and marine salt production in China, the countries surrounding the two China Seas produce about one-third of a billion dollars worth of marine nonfuel minerals annually. This figure is small in comparison, for example, with offshore crude oil production, estimated at $11 billion in that year. From a global perspective, output of marine nonfuel minerals from the East and South China seas is proportionately much more important to world marine nonfuel production than the output of marine hydrocarbons from the same region is to world marine hydrocarbon production. Taking only sand and gravel and tin production, the marine mines in these two seas produce almost one-quarter of Broadus’ (1987) estimated $600 million annual revenues from all seabed nonfuel materials world wide. Nearshore minerals have the best prospects, and the prospects for deepsea minerals, although they occur in the region, are remote and should not influence maritime boundary settlements.
