ANGOLA – Minbos Resources Limited, an exploration and development company in Angola has inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the International Fertilizer Development Center (IFDC) for the Cabinda Phosphate project that seeks to develop the fertilizer market for smallholder farmers in the country.
IFDC is a science-based public international organization working to alleviate global hunger by introducing improved agricultural practices and fertilizer technologies to farmers and by linking them to markets.
The project will leverage on IFDC’s innovative research, market expertise and strategic partnerships to identify sustainable solutions for soil and plant nutrition to benefit smallholder farmers, local communities, and the environment.
Angola remains a promising, untouched agricultural resource. With 35 million hectares of arable land, high rainfall, and some of the lowest fertilizer application rates globally, Angolan agriculture proves to be full of potential.
Development of Angola’s fertilizer market will be a major step toward increasing food security within the country.
Minbos is scheduled to begin production of 50,000 tons of fertilizer per year in 2022. With IFDC’s strong record of delivering high-impact projects boost fertilizer usage, demand is expected to exceed 150,000 tons per year.
“As the company looks to enter production in early 2022, securing market offtake through a program that unlocks value for local smallholder farmers and government stakeholders, as well as Minbos shareholders, is key to our successful collaboration.
“This first step in developing a project to establish a new market in Angola marks another milestone for the Company,” Lindsay Reed, CEO, Minbos said.
IFDC will work with the public and private sector to create or expand fertilizer demand in select parts of Angola.
Strengthening the market system will make it possible for the country’s smallholder farmers to receive the products they need to grow more food and earn better livelihoods.
Productivity gains from increased fertilizer use are expected to yield marketable crop surpluses, encouraging further farmer investment in inputs. The project is expected to reach over 4 million smallholder farmers.
Minbos, listed at the ASX received the go-ahead to undertake the Cabinda Project from the Angolan Ministry of Mineral Resources and Petroleum in March 2020.
The company expects to mine Phosphate Rock from the Cácata Deposit and transport it to the Porto de Caio where all the necessary electricity, gas, water and shipping infrastructure exists to build and operate a granulation plant to produce enhanced phosphate rock granules.
The granules will become the Phosphate nutrient feedstock to blend with imported Nitrogen and Potassium granules in NPK blending plants to exact specifications suited to Angolan crops and soils.
Fertilizer consumption on the African continent is projected to reach 13.6 million tonnes by 2030.
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