How Sweden Is Becoming Insanely Rich 

As a Swede I have to admit that this video is more action than any news broadcast 😄

I am glad that some people are actually talking about this. I feel like this has been in the news for about a day here in Sweden and then was forgotten about. I hope that the swedish government takes a bit of the "norwegian approach" on how to deal with their natural ressources. The money and profits belong to everybody in Sweden, not just big companies.

I'm so glad to see content of such high quality pertaining to European events. So excited to see what this channel releases next!

As a swede I hate that every time Sweden is featured in any kind of news or video, you'll have swedes starting their comment with "As a swede".

I think you missed one of the central points with rare earths. As you rightly mentioned, there are multiple stages to take rare earths from mineral deposit to refined material ready to add to a manufactured good. In Australia, we mine rare earths and refine very little. Most goes to Malaysia and China for first stage refining (the really dirty part), second stage refining is often done in advanced countries like Japan. The question is, will the EU be able to refine the rare earths from start to finish from this mine - given its environmental standards? China has subsidised the west in off shoring pollution and subsidising cost. The US and EU need to find a way to be able to stomach the true cost of rare earths, if they want to make their own rare earth deposits matter.

As a swede, i hope this gets handled correctly and with caution.

The script of this video is one of the best yet in my opinion. A great balance of information and humour and simple yet effective explanation combining those two. Great content thank you.

I’m glad to see this channel already has so many subscribers. Y’all really deserve it!

As an American I’m confused since Sweden already is a democracy and we can’t bring it to them. 😅

INB4 the Sami blocks these resources from being mined. They rather see the world dependant on China or slave labor in Africa before they allow their priceless reindeer to have to walk to another area.

I hope Sweden takes an example from Norway and puts the profits from those metals into sth like a retirement fund so it will keep producing dividends, making Sweden truly richer.

I am excited as a Swede, and I wonder how the government is going to find a way to screw this up as well.

The deposit has been known for almost a hundred years but was to "polluted" to be a good iron mine but was called a pension security for the Kiruna mine. Also, the apatite in Kiruna mine propper was not mined for fosfate so all of that is in the old tailing dams and they are looking into how to easily get to that.

Fun fact: rare earth minerals are actually not rare at all. It is just way more expensive to mine and process them unless they are in very specific dense deposits in a specific form. China simply has cheap labor and a lot of them, thus swamping the market.

We’ve driven through Kiruna this year. It’s astonishing how this whole city is just a giant mine and that it’s going to be the heart of mining in the future

I am originally German but moved to Sweden in the summer of 2022. The book I used to learn Swedish had a story in it that took place in Kiruna. It ends with the characters being worried that they need to leave their old house because the open-air mines consume the city. This video reminded me of that.

Kiruna is such an interesting city.Ever since the mining which sacked the old city center they just started building a really cool new center. You definitely want to keep up with that!

How lucky for Europe that both in Sweden they found that huge lump of rare earth minerals, while Norway recently found a big chunk of rock-phosphate as well.

Love the video and that you shed some light on the importance of rare earth metals. I just noticed an error in frame 6:15. The Baogang Steel and Rare Earth complex is in "inner Mongolia (China)" and not in Mongolia.

This is fastest growing channel i have ever seen . With less than 10 high quality and informative videos you guy have reached about 400k followers and millions of watches. Good luck fren.

Respect to you for making a dry subject sound interesting. Great editing and delivery.

i am from Sweden. You would be surprised how many very useful minerals we have in the ground. the problem is the people, they say "dont destroy our beautiful fields and views!" And when you ask them, where should they dig it then? they say "somewhere else, but not here".

Swedish people itself is not getting rich. It's the companies behind these discoveries which always the Wallenberg Family's companies.

Swedish iron is known to be some of the best world wide and has been for a long time

How do I not know about this until now as a swede?! Great coverage!

Having read some articles in Sweden about it (mainly DN), we are still unsure how to fully approach other than forward, which is still a positive, even if slowed down. Some articles say that it might take a whole century to fully have this "economic boom", although LKAB themselves (mining company) is certain that something big is coming out of it, using the situation to extend their contract with Railcare to help move materials. In politics though, I'm not so sure. Probably could research more about it, but from what I've seen purely from reactions, I hope that politics won't play too much into this golden egg. It's not a quick and simple job, but hopefully this is one opportunity we won't throw away.

Literally just checked out the channel 10 minutes ago because I was wondering when you uploaded the last time and now I get a notification that a new video is out :)

FERN you missed something huge! Kiruna had a huge city ontop of it, maybe it would be helpfull to add that LKAB moved the entire city to another location

Your storytelling dude ❤️ well balanced script with whole lot of explanation little bit of humor, conclusion and expectations...Its easy to understand. I leaned something here.

This channel never fails to make any topic interesting 😂

I can only agree with what the others said....this channel will become huge and you most certainly deserve it ! The quality of the storytelling is top notch !

Great news, but it needs to be taken into consideration that just the environmental permitting might take up to ten years, add then the time needed for opening the mine, building processing and refinement plants, etc. The potential is huge, but it will take a while to manifest.

As Norwegian i typically dont wish fortune to Sweden. But this feeling of sticking it right up to China is great news

Amazing video! The graphics and the script together made one of the best explanatory videos I have seen.

It's not inly in Kiruna but they also found a huge deposit around the Jönköping area in Southern Sweden. Which means there is a possibility for 2 of said mines

Wow the production value is just astonishing. Well done guys! Keep it up, love it

FUN FACT: Kiruna has moved hundreds of houses and buildings from the mining sites in order to prevent the ground collapsing. YES! Moving houses. The metals are so valuable that it's still worth it.

wow, this channel has like 8 videos and they are all top notch quality. Usually channels start slow but not this channel. I can see this channel having atleast a few million subs in a few years

As a geologist finishing my master in Sweden, I can't wait to get to Kiruna to discover all the different REE that we will get there. Hopefully it's not the same as the Bastnäs type crystallization and it's some heavy REE and not some light REE which would be less valuable

@fern, this is one of the best informative videos I've ever seen on RU-vid. The pace, script, graphics, and content are all top-notch. Keep it up

This is definitely your best video yet. I am really hyped about the future of fern. It was concise, humourous and entertaining, great work!

As a swede this makes me really excited and hopeful for a better and brighter future for everyone

Great video and very informative! I'm stunned that this is the first time I'm hearing about this mine! 😱 Then again, I just learned of the Woodsmith mine a couple of months ago...🙄 I know mining is a bit of a boring subject to most people, excluding any close relatives of working miners I suppose. 🤔 These two mines are key assets for the European economy, for the rest of this century! Food security, without resorting to ever more toxic industrial chemical fertilizers! 🎉 And we might have the opportunity to leverage the concentrated scientific and practical know how and growing chip industry, into fully localized production. I'm happy the swedes have it, I trust them to handle this responsibly 😊❤

Text at 6:15 says “Mongolia” but it’s in the Chinese region of Inner Mongolia, so not in Mongolia

I'm not even living in the EU but hope that Sweden doesn't screw this up by either making it to expensive/non competitive due to overdoing it with green policies or it being blocked due to EU bureaucracy. The world needs less dependency on China and the EU itself needs more political weight on the global stage - currently it's more of a play ground for other world powers.

How THIS channel is becoming content worthy!

As a Swede I applaud this message, with our rich neighbors Norway and Denmark and the disastrous exchange rate we have at the moment, it'd be nice if Sweden got to be rich too.

I'm excited as a Swede. I would not be surprised if our Politicians are now basically reading up on how Norway handles its oil for inspiration. x)

Certified Fern gang classic

When you really watch this video sitting on the toilet…

So why am i paying 20 crowns for a milk carton?

love the content keep up the good work

I still need to get used to Jonas speaking English 😅😅

Well done, as always! I really do hope that this channel reaches its full potential!

Throughout history, Sweden has been a major exporter of many different minerals. Stora Kopparberg - Large Copper Mountain Located near Falun in Sweden and part of the Falu Gruva (Falun Mine) It met 2/3 of Europe's copper demands. It is the reason basically every old cottage was painted in Falu Red and you can still see many wooden houses painted red as a tradition and homage to the old days. Copper was a vitally important resource for all sorts of things, especially weapons of war, back in the day and even today it's important as conductors of electricity and signals. Not to mention all the copper windings you need in electric vehicles. Sweden back in the days funded all its wars with the resources it extracted from its copper mines. Nowadays Sweden considers itself neutral, but at the time where the copper mines were opened it spawned an era of countless wars of territorial expansion for Sweden that was only really stopped by the rise of the Russian empire and Napoleon's conquests. Sweden could otherwise very well have been in control of most of Europe. A superpower. Kiruna Mine - Iron Throughout all of northern Sweden you find many deposits of Iron ore. Need i say more? Sweden has always been a major exporter of not just iron ore in its raw form but many iron derived products starting with pig iron and going all the way to high grade steel. Sweden was not just known for the amount of iron they provided but the QUALITY of said iron and its derivatives as they used cutting edge technologies throughout the times to make the best iron and steel the world had ever seen. Nazi Germany in particular would have had no way of going on for as long as they did without Sweden's iron. And Sweden was never invaded by Nazi Germany, not because Germany couldn't. They could have taken Sweden easily. But because Sweden, unlike many others, cooperated willingly with Germany mostly without any pressure to do so. There were quite a lot of political and cultural similarities between Sweden and Germany and Hitler got many of his ideologies from Sweden at the time. Sweden even had the "Rasbiologiska Institutet" (The Institute for Racial Biology) and practiced eugenics at the time and even for some time after WWII. Boliden - Gold Sweden was the second largest producer of gold in Europe. Not that it mattered that much at the time to be honest. Sala Silvergruva - A silver mine that extracted silver from Galena Again, not very notable but remained in operation for a very long time. And a few more... All of them together made Sweden into, if we were to go into Tolkien fantasy lore like The Lord of The Rings, a bunch of dwarves that dug deep without ever encountering a Balrog. Sweden would otherwise been an insignificant and poor region who's only export would be that of it's wood industry. Which by itself is a pretty large industry, but not enough to make Sweden anything more than a struggling footnote in history. Norway has its oil, Denmark has its food and machinery, Finland has it's wood and paper. Sweden has its metals. And of course, the "Scandinavian unity" that is inherent amongst true Scandinavians has also made all four of these countries very rich in terms of technology, expertise, craftmanship, culture and standards of living as a whole. They take care of each other so no one is left too far behind. Nowadays though... Not so much. And the discovery of rare earths has the potential of providing a major upswing for Sweden but will most likely make a huge belly flop where all the potential is wasted due to poor political management and too much talk about it and no actions being taken. And it is likely to be sneakily gobbled up by Chinese interests right from under our noses in the process.

Dafür dass es nicht deine Muttersprache ist bist du wahnsinnig gut :) mehr Videos von dir vertont wären cool

I'm just here to view all the 'As a Swede' comments.

Suddenly the US feels the refugee crisis in Sweden requires a more *freedom based solution*

You did not mention the most important part! The refinery of the rare metals ONLY can be done BY CHINA. This is the control point, where it comes much more expensive the refine your own metals that just buying them from china 🙂 As long there is NO INFRASTRUCTURE in europe for doing this, the costs of building them up will raise the price, too. And you didnt tell how rare the rare metals really are, in 1T of iron ore is 0,2% ? With this 2 points given, swedens findings are no longer the exclamation mark for europe.

Damn i'm glad i discovered this channel. The content is so good, funny, well made, straight to the point. You guys rock! (Boudum tshhh)

Ja! Sverige är bra!

"Sweden is richter than ever..." what a finish

I would like to see another video on how this is affecting the Sàmi people. Not only concerning environmental issues and it’s effects on reindeer herding, but also in the context of discrimination of indigenous people and human rights. It’s a complex subject indeed, and as profitable an industry as this is, I only hope that the government will not allow profit at the expense of suffering.

As a Swede I feel so sorry for Ebba Busch. After her appearance in TV, "all swedes" talked about her expensive jacket she had during the visit in the north. No one really remember the news she presented

Sweden are just really in a very well position - once more. I am glad if whole Europe can profit from this. Huge news

If the United States didn't lean so left environmentally, the United States would be a rare earth mineral powerhouse

Sweden is rich because of innovation. Most tech billionares / capita. Most dollar millionaires / citizens .

For reference… China has 44 million tons of Rare earth metals readily available for “easy” extraction. 1 million tons is good and all, but not THAT significant long term, specially when they require specialized and expensive mining tech. Even with this, the EU will still be heavily reliant on China, specially on a price competitiveness front. That said, this obviously good news!!

you lost me on "you go outside"

Hopefully Sweden is also aware of the resource curse. Exciting times ahead.

as a swede, I really hope this does not interfere with the ongoing transition of a monopolar world to a multipolared one.

As a Swedish citizen, I must say that the increasing cost of bread does not make it seem like things are getting better.

Russia might invade Sweden if it's worth it.

Cheers for putting the ad at the end, just for this reason i've watched it ! Good video keep it up

Your videos have an insane level of quality. -- Just finished binging 90% of them over the last few days. Great channel.

the production level and effort put into this video outshines many I've seen previously, subscribed (y)

Sweden's biggest economy is weaponry. This will just make Sweden richer.

I went in on LKAB's website to verify and its correct. Per Geijer will add an additional 25% more to rare metalls to a total of 1,3 million tons and its not yet finalized how big it is. I had no idea of the geopolitical situation as stated in the video, suddenly Sweden is on the big map. Who could have guessed?

as always the production and insight info in your videos are top.

Geopolitically, rare earth elements are a bigger deal than most ppl realize. They call them oil wars but once you look at the other mineral deposits it adds a layer of intrigue at the very least....

Imagine a country maintaining a state mining company and being able to keep all that profit for the good of its citizens. If this happened in the UK the mining rights would be sold for faction of their worth so the government's mega rich friends can become even richer.

I can confirm, we are definitely not getting insanely rich.

It is worrying that a Swede should find out about this by chance on RU-vid. Our government has not mentioned this at all.

Kiruna= the place to be! I hope I can go there some time again in the future, although they moved the city since my last visit due to the ground being unstable from mining.

I am swedish and i have a strange suspicion that i won’t be seeing a dime of that wealth

And what happens when the mines shut down...

Absolutely love this kind of videos! Subscribed! ✅

Great video, but the audio was distorted at 1:02 2:40 and worst at 9:52. You might want to track down that problem and fix it for future videos. Thank you.

We have started digging. Will be done in 8 years 👍

Great and informative video! Although just want to state that LKAB is not a public company, it is fully owned by the Swedish state ( 10:36 )

Lived 2 years in Sweden. Lovely folk, fabulous xc skiing, good coffee, loved it. It is my belief they will manage the resource well. Mycke bra Sverige! Sorry forgot mine Svenska mana years ago. Day go bra!

As a geologist, this is amazing. Just look at Bayan Obo and it's consequences. It's the largest REE mine in the world with 50 % of global REE production. Mining REE in Europe means way better safety and environmental concerns. Mining has to be done and outsourcing it to poor countries to make yourself look good on an environmental standpoint is not the solution.

You don't see this when living here, infrastructure is falling apart, it doesn't look like a rich nation

The title is misleading. Everything is getting more and more expensive and life gets harder and harder for the average swede.

Your video is very helpful! Thanks and congrats on a million!!

I hope our government will leverage our rare earth metals like the Norwegians leveraged their oil, establishing a REM Fund for the entire country/society. It’s an exciting time in Sweden actually.

When it comes to Rare Earth Elements (REEs) used in magnets, the Norra Kärr mine in Sweden has more of them than the Per Geijer mine. However, the Norra Kärr mine is owned by a Canadian company, so the government doesn't promote it in their propaganda. Therefore, if both mines are permitted, which seems likely, Sweden will have the two largest REE mines in Europe.

"Insanely rich" :) We've had extensive iron mining up there since 1890, and that's certainly contributed to Swedish wealth, but that kind of peaked in the 1970's, when we were on par with Switzerland and Luxemburg. Then the krona was on par with the Swiss Franc, now it's less than 10%. The current mine is getting empty, and it's time to get going with the next, actually bigger finding. If you look at what the mining company is writing about this, the main asset in the Per Geijer finding is -- drum roll -- iron. Mining the rare earth minerals wouldn't even be worth the effort if it wasn't for the iron. Due to the additional incomes from the rare earths, this mine will probably be viable longer than otherwise, but the reason the Swedish press aren't more excited about this is that's it's not the huge think this video tries to suggest. This is money earned over a period of several decades. In the best case it adds a few percent to the total Swedish income.

1:39 rare earth metal

Wow the production in this video is amazing. Good job