"We are asking for an accelerated and prioritized consideration by the National Assembly, so that [the agreements] can be approved by the entire Congress and investments can be attracted," Arnes said in an interview with Bolivia TV.
On September 11, the Bolivian government signed a contract with Uranium One Group, a subsidiary of Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom, to build a lithium carbonate plant for batteries with a capacity of 14,000 tonnes per year and an investment of $970 million. Two weeks later, an agreement was signed with China's Hong Kong CBC to build two lithium carbonate plants with a comparable investment.
Bolivia has reserves of 23 million tonnes of lithium and the country is a member of the Lithium Triangle, where the world's largest deposits of the metal are located, along with Argentina with its 19 million tonnes and Chile with 9 million tonnes.