Resource hungry China has been gobbling up metals produced by Rio Tinto and other miners but with prices rising it’s not always an easy relationship. Most recently negotiations over iron ore prices pitted the world’s largest miners against Chinese steelmakers in a bitter dispute. Now Rio Tinto has decided its time for a change of tune, and rather than just treating China as its most lucrative customer, it wants to make the country a strategic partner as well.

Last week, Chief Executive Tom Albanese said that Rio Tinto wanted to work with state-owned Chinese companies on projects abroad.

”Rio Tinto has been very successful in discovering some of the biggest new ore bodies in the world. Many are in very remote locations that require a lot of infrastructure,” Albanese told the South China Morning Post on Friday, adding that he saw opportunities for “large-sale development” of these projects with Chinese state-owned companies.

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