Norway’s Norsk Hydro and strategic partner Sociedad Quimica y Minera de Chile (SQM) have signed a joint venture agreement together with two Egyptian entrepreneurs with the intention to produce and market liquid fertilizers in Egypt through a new, jointly owned company.
Hydro and SQM will each own 47.5 percent of the shares of the Misr Speciality Fertilizer Company (MSF). The two local partners will each own 2.5 percent. MSF will appoint Hydro Agri Trade Egypt, a distribution company owned by Hydro and local partners, as its exclusive sales agent for the domestic market.
Construction of the plant is expected to be completed in the course of 2004. Full commercial and technical capacity utilization of the 85,000-ton-per-year facility is forecast within six years from start of production.
The factory, to be built in Noberia in northern Egypt, will be designed to host additional dry fertilizer activities, if and when the partners agree on future developments in this direction. — (menareport.com)
© 2003 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
