Foreign ministers from Australia, India, Japan and the United States said they would map semiconductor and artificial intelligence hardware supply-chain chokepoints before disruption, amid concern about economic coercion and arbitrary export restrictions.
The ministers met in Atlanta on Oct. 31 alongside the Group of 20 (G20) Foreign Ministers’ Meeting. Their joint statement said they had “grave concerns regarding economic coercion, including through arbitrary export restrictions.” The document also criticized policies outside market rules that it said can cause excess capacity and unsettle supply chains in critical industries. It did not name a country responsible for those practices.
The ministers described their intended technical and financial support for trusted artificial intelligence access in the Indo-Pacific as exceeding $85 million, with the Quad SI Accelerator named as one component. A footnote defines the release’s phrase “Super Intelligence” as artificial intelligence in Australia, India and Japan. The statement gives no allocation by country, funding source for the AI total, project list or delivery schedule.
The United States separately pledged $10 million for infrastructure and facilities in India and Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries that recover critical minerals from waste. The Quad said the recycling work is meant to reduce reliance on a single supplier.
This builds on the May 26 critical-minerals framework announced by the four governments, which described an ambition to mobilize as much as $20 billion in public and private backing through a mix of ongoing and new initiatives. That effort aims to strengthen critical-mineral supply chains.
The ministers also reaffirmed the need to protect navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, Red Sea and Bab el-Mandeb Strait without tolls, under international law as reflected in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
Quad export credit agencies are due to meet in Tokyo on Nov. 18 to discuss areas for practical cooperation. The announcement gave no time for the meeting.
