Financial Times
Morocco secures $250m loan to upgrade phosphate industry
A welcome boost to Morocco’s lucrative and strategic phosphate mining and processing industry has come in the form of a $250m loan from the African Development Bank.
Developing the industry is a key objective for the north African state. But it also has implications for agriculture in the region by increasing the supply of locally-produced fertiliser.
The phosphate industry supplies almost a third of Morocco’s exports and employs 20,000 people. Revenues rose nearly 32 per cent in 2011 to $6.5bn.
The funds will be used to help build a facility in the coastal town of Jorf Lasfar, about 110km southwest of Casablanca, which will eventually include several chemical plants. That will increase Morocco’s ability to process locally mined raw phosphate into value-added derivatives such as phosphoric acid and fertiliser.
“This will contribute to the attainment of objectives in the global program to develop African agriculture and to provide for food security,” the government said in a statement.
Phosphate, a mineral critical for the production of agricultural fertilisers and other industrial products, has huge significance for Morocco. The impoverished kingdom of 32m people has been struggling to maintain political stability and lure foreign investment during 18 months of upheaval throughout the Arab world.
Morocco’s economy is Africa’s fifth largest. The African Development Bank has more than $2.6bn invested in the country.
But the phosphate industry is also a source of controversy. Much of the mineral Morocco extracts comes from the occupied Western Sahara. Rabat considers the territory its own even though the United Nations rejects the claim. The Polisario Front, a separatist group claiming to represent the natives of Western Sahara, insists any phosphate exports from territory are illegal.
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