China not a national security threat: Andrew Forrest

International Monetary Fund managing director Kristalina Georgieva said on Sunday China had to “reinvent itself” as it struggles to get through a property downturn that has caused consumer prices to fall at their steepest rate in 14 years.

“China faces a fork in the road – rely on the policies that have worked in the past, or reinvent itself for a new era of high-quality growth,” she said.

The foreign investment plunge has also been driven by national security fears following raids on US and Japanese firms in China, and the detention of foreign executives across the financial, pharmaceutical and consultancy sectors.

Forrest said fears for staff in China were “in the eyes of the beholder”.

“I have not seen that. None of our staff have had anything but a friendly welcome,” he said. “If there is the first sign of anything else, I would be the loudest spokesman against it.”

Forrest described Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s handling of the relationship with Beijing as mature. Wong met with Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi for the sixth time last week after all ministerial contact was cut off under the former Coalition government.

Forrest said any cyber interference with democratic institutions “must be called out and stopped” and that human rights standards had to be maintained. But he said the trading relationship also had to be nurtured.

“Competition with China improves the standard of living, provided we completely obey the standards of human rights and uphold and increase the health of the environment,” he said.

Wong raised one of the mining industry’s top priorities in her meeting with Wang – stabilising the price of nickel, which has resulted in hundreds of jobs cut as Chinese and Indonesian miners fill the market with lower-quality product. In January, Forrest announced he would shut down the West Australian nickel mines of his company, Wyloo Metals, after prices fell.

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Chinese nickel producers have been accused of pillaging the environment to mine for nickel. Nickel is a key element in electric vehicle batteries and China is now the world’s largest electric vehicle market.

“What I say behind closed doors and publicly is that the global supply chains of China must now uphold the same standards, particularly on the environment,” Forrest said.

“The nickel price is recovering. But I have to say candidly, that’s a second-order priority. My first-order priority is not to destroy rainforests and marine environments.”