Zinc got off to a rough start in 2016, but it ended the year as the best-performing metal on the LME. Many market watchers are optimistic about the base metal's prospects in 2017, and John Kaiser of Kaiser Research is one of them. In the video interview above, he explains zinc's supply and demand dynamics, noting that in the past there's been little interest in bringing new zinc deposits online because China has been such a dominant producer. "Because China has always increased supply to meet any growth in demand, the price has never really gone up, so nothing has been developed," he says. Now, however, Chinese zinc production is running into problems. According to Kaiser, China produces the metal from small deposits, "many of them very polluting" - as the country continues to crack down on pollution, it will become more difficult for it to produce as much zinc as it has in the past. "That, I think, will help zinc go a lot higher than people expect," he believes.In light of those circumstances, Kaiser sees zinc optionality plays as "really interesting." InZinc Mining (TSXV:IZN), which is focused on its Utah-based West Desert project, is one of his favorites. "This is almost like a hybrid optionality type of system where we know this is here, we know at what price this is worth developing, but is there a lot more," he says. Watch the video for more of Kaiser's thoughts on InZinc Mining and the zinc market as a whole. He also discusses Arizona Mining (TSX:AZ), which was one of his picks last year. You can click the links below to go directly to different parts of the interview:0:12 - zinc supply/demand dynamics5:10 - InZinc Mining overview6:00 - Arizona Mining overview