TY - JOUR

T1 - Analysis of long-term statistical data of cobalt flows in the EU

AU - Godoy León, María Fernanda

AU - Blengini, Gian Andrea

AU - Dewulf, Jo

N1 - Funding Information: Financial support from the Special Research Fund (BijzonderOnderzoeksfonds – BOF) from Ghent University under grant agreement number BOF.DOC.2017.0041.01 is gratefully acknowledged. We thank the two anonymous reviewers whose comments and suggestions helped improve and clarify this manuscript. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Authors

PY - 2021/10

Y1 - 2021/10

N2 - Long-term statistical data was explored, acquired, processed, and analysed in order to assess the historical domestic production and international trade of a number of cobalt-containing commodities in the EU. Different data sources were examined for data, such as the British Geological Survey (BGS), the US Geological Survey (USGS), and the Eurostat and UN Comtrade (UNC) databases, considering all EU-member states before and after they joined the EU. For the international trade, hidden flows related to data gaps such as data reported in monetary value or recorded as “special category” were identified and included in the analysis. In addition, data from the Finnish customs database (ULJAS) was used to complement flows reported by Eurostat and UNC. From UNC, data was obtained considering the member states as reporters or as partners of the trade, due to internal differences of the database. Based on the acquired data the domestic production and international trade of the commodities were reconstructed for the timeframes 1938–2018 and 1988–2018, respectively. Next to the analysis of the trend of the production and trade of the different commodities, the importance of including hidden flows was revealed, where hidden flows represented more than 50% of the flow of a year in some cases. In addition, it was identified that even from reliable data sources, strong differences (more than 100% in some cases) can be found in the reported data, which is crucial to consider when utilizing the data in research.

AB - Long-term statistical data was explored, acquired, processed, and analysed in order to assess the historical domestic production and international trade of a number of cobalt-containing commodities in the EU. Different data sources were examined for data, such as the British Geological Survey (BGS), the US Geological Survey (USGS), and the Eurostat and UN Comtrade (UNC) databases, considering all EU-member states before and after they joined the EU. For the international trade, hidden flows related to data gaps such as data reported in monetary value or recorded as “special category” were identified and included in the analysis. In addition, data from the Finnish customs database (ULJAS) was used to complement flows reported by Eurostat and UNC. From UNC, data was obtained considering the member states as reporters or as partners of the trade, due to internal differences of the database. Based on the acquired data the domestic production and international trade of the commodities were reconstructed for the timeframes 1938–2018 and 1988–2018, respectively. Next to the analysis of the trend of the production and trade of the different commodities, the importance of including hidden flows was revealed, where hidden flows represented more than 50% of the flow of a year in some cases. In addition, it was identified that even from reliable data sources, strong differences (more than 100% in some cases) can be found in the reported data, which is crucial to consider when utilizing the data in research.

KW - Cobalt

KW - Critical raw materials

KW - Domestic production

KW - International trade

KW - Long-term statistical data

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85109069352&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105690

DO - 10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105690

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 34602748

AN - SCOPUS:85109069352

VL - 173

JO - Resources, Conservation and Recycling

JF - Resources, Conservation and Recycling

SN - 0921-3449

M1 - 105690

ER -