Maaden Phosphate Co signs debt for major project

16 June 2008 11:32  [Source: ICIS news]

DUBAI (ICIS news)--Maaden Phosphate Co (MPC) has signed major financial agreements for its integrated phosphate fertilizer projects, Saudi Arabian Mining Co (Maaden) said on Monday.

The agreements signed were for the syndicated facilities which comprise $2.06bn, 16-year conventional and Islamic facilities, a $200m, 16-year Korean Export Insurance Corp covered facility, a $400m, 16-year facility provided by the Export-Import Bank of Korea and $100m of revolving working capital.

Direct funding will also be provided by Riyadh's Public Investment Fund (PIF) for $1,067m and the Saudi Industrial Development Fund for $135m.

The company would also soon hold an initial public offering, said Maaden president CEO and MPC chairman Abdallah Dabbagh in a statement. 

MPC is developing two projects, the first at the Al-Jalamid mine in the north of the kingdom, which will comprise a phosphate, mine and a beneficiation plant.

The second is at the Ras az-Zawr site on the kingdom's eastern coast Gulf around 90 km north of Al-Jubail with a fertiliser production facility comprising diammonium phosphate (DAP), ammonia, sulphuric acid and phosphoric acid processing plants.

MPC will produce an estimated 2.92m tonne/year of granular DAP, plus approximately 440,000 tonne/year of excess ammonia for export to the world markets and around 160,000 tonnes/year of excess phosphoric acid for the domestic market.

The total cost of the projects is expected to exceed SR20.7bn ($5.52bn).

More than 75% of total capital costs have been contracted at a fixed rate under signed lump-sum turnkey (LSTK) contracts for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) of the plants.

About 30% of the total project costs would be funded by equity contributions from Maaden and Saudi Basic Industries Corp (SABIC) in proportion to their interests in the project - 70% Maaden and 30% SABIC.

($1 = SR3.75)

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By: Abdelghani Henni
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