According to Bloomberg, the Saudi Railway Organization has successfully tested a newly-built railway line connecting phosphate and bauxite mines in the North of Saudi Arabia, operated by Saudi Arabian Mining, with the Persian Gulf.

A country well aware of the importance of natural resources as a wealth-driving factor – after all it is the world’s biggest exporter of oil – Saudi Arabia sees the railway project as part of a bigger plan to diversify its economy away from oil.  Phosphate and bauxite production certainly won’t rival oil, but this smart strategic move immediately puts Saudi Arabia on the map as one of the top ten bauxite-producing countries.

If there’s a lesson here for the U.S. (all of whose bauxite is foreign-sourced, by the way) it’s that if even affluent nations with no obvious immediate need to diversify their resource bases are reassessing their mineral policies, we can’t afford not to do the same if we want to be competitive in the long run.