![\"chile](\"http:\/\/static.businessinsider.com\/image\/4bd596387f8b9ae56d7e0200-284-212\/chile-copper-mine.jpg\")
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By now you’ve read a million stories on China’s aggressive acquisition of natural resources all over the world, but here’s a story with a little bit of a twist.<\/p>\n
In Australia and New Zealand, Beijing is spending millions to fund upstart miners in the hopes of undermining the world’s big two: Rio Tinto and BHP Billiton.<\/p>\n
The New Zealand Herald<\/a> reports that Chinese state-owned enterprises have funded at least 20 firms, in order to bust the big duopoly.<\/p>\n Whereas in the past, only the big ones could compete for large-scale resource deals, Chinese money is changing the playing field:<\/p>\n In Fortescue’s 2009 annual report to shareholders, [CEO Andrew] Forrest wrote that his company was battling against BHP and Rio Tinto on their home mining turf of the Pilbara, a northern region possessing the nation’s richest iron ore deposits.<\/p>\n “Your company has shattered the iron ore duopoly which existed in the Pilbara for many decades and firmly established itself as a vital alternative supplier of iron ore,” wrote Forrest.<\/p>\n Not only is China trying to bust the duopoly through cash, some suspect it’s using non-market means, like its pursuit of Rio Tinto execs on spying charges (a charge that originally came after Rio Tinto and BHP tried to merge, a scuttled deal that originally prompted howls of outrage in Beijing).<\/p>\n Bottom line, there’s probably tons of money to be made selling commodities to China over the coming years. Who actually wins big, however, remains an interesting question.<\/p>\n For more on Chinese commodity demand, see this presentation from the miner Vale ><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n