Minister of Trade, Industry and Energy Bang Moon-kyu pledged to pursue partial government support for the cost of importing urea from countries other than China.

At a meeting with reporters on Wednesday, Bang addressed the recent suspension of urea exports by Beijing in noting that the annual value of urea used in South Korea amounts to less than 300 million U.S. dollars, of which those for vehicles take up a small portion.

The minister said the government will push to cover some of the import costs for companies that opt to purchase urea from countries like Vietnam, which would cost around ten percent more than Chinese imports, for an extra 26 billion won, or about 20 million dollars, annually.

Bang, meanwhile, expected local firms' reliance on Chinese imports of graphite, a key material in secondary batteries, to significantly drop within several years following Beijing's related export curbs this month.

The minister said Posco Future M plans to build a plant with the aim of increasing production to surpass 16-thousand tons by early 2025, which is about 45 percent of domestic demand.