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Fourth Future Minerals Forum Starts in Riyadh

The fourth edition of the forum, held between January 14 and 16 - SPA
The fourth edition of the forum, held between January 14 and 16 - SPA
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Fourth Future Minerals Forum Starts in Riyadh

The fourth edition of the forum, held between January 14 and 16 - SPA
The fourth edition of the forum, held between January 14 and 16 - SPA

Under the patronage of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, the fourth edition of the Future Minerals Forum kicked off in Riyadh. The event features representatives from over 90 countries, including 16 G20 nations, 50 international governmental and non-governmental organizations, commodity trade associations, and leading figures in the global mining industry.
The forum began with the Fourth Ministerial Roundtable meeting, which aims to bolster international collaboration in producing the critical minerals essential for the global energy transition. It provides a platform for ministers and senior officials to discuss sustainable development strategies for the mining sector, focusing on positioning mining as a catalyst for economic growth and social progress, SPA reported.
The government officials met to lead global action on minerals around three key initiatives: Strategic Framework for Critical Minerals, which aims to develop a collaborative framework in the Super Region of Africa, West, and Central Asia to harness the region's mineral potential fully; Sustainability, aimed at the development of responsible supply priorities that reflect local realities in supplier countries and enhance transparency through supply chain certification; and Centers of Excellence, establishing a network to drive investments, develop human capital, and accelerate technological innovation within the Super Region and supplier countries.
The fourth edition of the forum, held between January 14 and 16, features 250 speakers, including CEOs of leading mining and mineral-related companies and financial institutions. Around 15,000 participants are expected to attend its sessions.

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Chili Paste Heats Up Dishes at Northeastern Tunisia’s Harissa Festival

Chahida Boufaied, owner of Dar Chahida Lel Oula, prepares the Harissa in her house in Nabeul, Tunisia, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ons Abid)
Chahida Boufaied, owner of Dar Chahida Lel Oula, prepares the Harissa in her house in Nabeul, Tunisia, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ons Abid)
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Chili Paste Heats Up Dishes at Northeastern Tunisia’s Harissa Festival

Chahida Boufaied, owner of Dar Chahida Lel Oula, prepares the Harissa in her house in Nabeul, Tunisia, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ons Abid)
Chahida Boufaied, owner of Dar Chahida Lel Oula, prepares the Harissa in her house in Nabeul, Tunisia, Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Ons Abid)

For years, Tunisians have been picking bright red peppers, combining them with garlic, vinegar and spices and turning them into a saucy spread called harissa. The condiment is a national staple and pastime, found in homes, restaurants and food stalls throughout the coastal North African nation.

Brick-red, spicy and tangy, it can be scooped up on bread drizzled with olive oil or dabbed onto plates of eggs, fish, stews or sandwiches. Harissa can be sprinkled atop merguez sausages, smeared on savory pastries called brik or sandwiches called fricassées, The Associated Press reported.
In Nabeul, the largest city in Tunisia’s harissa-producing Cap Bon region, local chef and harissa specialist Chahida Boufayed called it “essential to Tunisian cuisine.”
“Harissa is a love story,” she said at a festival held in honor of the chili paste sauce in the northeastern Tunisian city of Nabeul earlier this month. “I don’t make it for the money.”
Aficionados from across Tunisia and the world converged on the 43-year-old mother’s stand to try her recipe. Surrounded by strings of drying baklouti red peppers, she described how she grows her vegetables and blends them with spices to make harissa.
The region’s annual harissa festival has grown in the two-plus years since the United Nations cultural organization, UNESCO, recognized the sauce on a list of items of intangible cultural heritage, said Zouheir Belamin, the president of the association behind the event, a Nabeul-based preservation group. He said its growing prominence worldwide was attracting new tourists to Tunisia, specifically to Nabeul.
UNESCO in 2022 called harissa an integral part of domestic provisions and the daily culinary and food traditions of Tunisian society, adding it to a list of traditions and practices that mark intangible cultural heritage.
Already popular across North Africa as well as in France, the condiment is gaining popularity throughout the world from the United States to China.
Seen as sriracha’s North African cousin, harissa is typically prepared by women who sun-dry harvested red peppers and then deseed, wash and ground them. Its name comes from “haras” – the Arabic verb for “to crush” – because of the next stage in the process.
The finished peppers are combined it with a mixture of garlic cloves, vinegar, salt, olive oil and spices in a mortar and pestle to make a fragrant blend. Variants on display at Nabeul’s Jan. 3-5 festival used cumin, coriander and different spice blends or types of peppers, including smoked ones, to create pastes ranging in color from burgundy to crimson.
“Making harissa is an art. If you master it, you can create wonders,” Boufayed said.