Overview
ISO 23664:2021 - Traceability of rare earths in the supply chain from mine to separated products - specifies requirements and guidance for designing and operating a traceability system for rare earth materials. It defines the information to be recorded by supply chain businesses as rare earths move from mines through beneficiation and hydrometallurgical processing to separated products. The standard helps improve supply chain transparency, environmental stewardship and product provenance for rare earths.
Key topics and requirements
- Scope and purpose: Traceability from mine to separated rare earth products, including recycled inputs where applicable.
- Planning a traceability system: Documented information, identification of counterparties and system design decisions.
- Unique identifier (UI): Requirement to establish identifiers that link shipments and batches across nodes.
- Operation: Procedures for primary producers, mass balance accounting (methodology not prescriptive), identification, blending/mixing, recycling and transaction records.
- Shipment information: Defines information to be transmitted between adjacent nodes (mine, beneficiation plant, hydrometallurgical plant, trader, separation plant).
- Performance and improvement: Monitoring, performance evaluation, nonconformity handling and corrective action processes.
- Limits and flexibility: The standard allows flexibility where perfect chain‑of‑custody is not feasible (e.g., recycled content, focus on element subsets like NdPr). It does not mandate a single mass balance methodology.
Practical applications
ISO 23664:2021 is intended for organizations involved in the rare earth supply chain that need to implement or improve traceability systems:
- Mines and beneficiation plants - record origin, concentrate lots and shipment identifiers.
- Hydrometallurgical and separation plants - document processing steps, product composition and transfers.
- Traders, brokers and transporters - maintain transaction records and shipment metadata.
- Recycling operations - define and disclose how recycled inputs are handled and traced.
- Regulators, auditors and downstream users - verify provenance, sustainability claims and environmental controls.
Benefits include improved supply chain transparency, pollution reduction, alignment with sustainability goals and better product quality assurance.
Related standards
- Work by ISO/TC 298 (Rare earth) and ongoing chain‑of‑custody guidance from ISO/TC 308 are relevant complements; ISO 23664:2021 is designed to be compatible with other traceability and sustainability frameworks without prescribing a single global approach.
Keywords: ISO 23664:2021, traceability, rare earths, supply chain, mine to separated products, mass balance, unique identifier, beneficiation, hydrometallurgical, separation plant, recycled rare earth materials.
