Non-ferrous metals are essential basic materials and important strategic materials for the development of the national economy, people's daily lives, defense industries, and science and technology. Modernization of agriculture, industrial modernization, national defense, and modernization of science and technology all rely on non-ferrous metals. The components or components required for cutting-edge weapons such as aircrafts, missiles, rockets, satellites, and nuclear submarines, as well as cutting-edge technologies such as atomic, television, communications, radar, and electronic computers, are mostly made of light metals and rare metals in non-ferrous metals; Without nickel, cobalt, tungsten, molybdenum, vanadium, niobium and other non-ferrous metals there will be no alloy steel production. The use of non-ferrous metals in certain applications, such as the power industry, is also considerable. Many countries in the world, especially the industrialized countries, are competing to develop the non-ferrous metals industry and increase the strategic reserves of non-ferrous metals.

Today's non-ferrous metals have become an important material basis for determining the development of a country's economy, science and technology, national defense construction, etc., and are the key strategic resources for enhancing the country's overall strength and safeguarding national security. As the largest non-ferrous metal production country, China has made considerable progress in the research field of non-ferrous metals, especially the development and utilization of complex low-grade non-ferrous metal resources.

China's non-ferrous metal industry has developed rapidly in the past 30 years and its production ranks first in the world in recent years. Non-ferrous metal technology has played an increasingly important role in national economic construction and modernization of national defense. At the same time, the contradiction between the shortage of non-ferrous metal resources and the demand for national economic development has become increasingly prominent. The dependence on foreign resources has increased year by year, which has seriously affected the healthy development of China's national economy.

With the development of the economy, the proven high-quality mineral resources are approaching depletion, not only causing the country to face a crisis of severe shortage of total supply of non-ferrous metal materials, but also because of the complex low grade of “difficult to explore, difficult to adopt, difficult to select, and difficult to smelt”. After the ore resources or secondary resources gradually become the main raw materials, it poses great challenges to traditional sciences such as geology, mining, beneficiation, metallurgy, materials, processing, and environment. The low quality of resources will make China's non-ferrous metals industry and related industries face a crisis of survival competition. The development of China's non-ferrous metals industry urgently needs new theories and technologies that adapt to the characteristics of China's resources. Non-ferrous metal technology with complete system, horizontal leadership and mutual integration will improve the independent innovation capability of China's non-ferrous metals industry, promote efficient, low-carbon, non-polluting and comprehensive utilization of non-ferrous metal resources to ensure the sustainable development of China's non-ferrous metals industry. Has a major boost.