Updated: Dangote fertiliser may hit market this month

Dangote Fertiliser Limited is on course to making its product available in the market this November, according to Devakumar Edwin, group executive director, strategy, portfolio development and capital projects, Dangote Industries Limited.

Edwin also said the Dangote Group is looking to get products from its refinery in the market by the fourth quarter of 2021.

Speaking with journalists at the facility located at Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos, on Wednesday, Edwin said the commissioning of the $2bn granulated urea fertiliser plant has been on and that the product would likely be in the market this month.

“Talking of fertiliser, actually the commissioning has started. I hope, by the grace of God, that we will have the product coming into the market this month,” he said.

The plant, with a capacity of 3 million tons per annum, has been classified as the biggest project in the history of the fertiliser industry.

Speaking on the 650,000-barrels-per-day Dangote Refinery, Edwin said it is currently at 80 percent overall completion.

He said the overall completion covers various aspects, including engineering and design, procurement, among others, which are at various advanced stages of completion, “but the core activity which is going on today is construction”.

“If you look at exclusively construction, we have finished 60 percent of it. Overall, 80 percent,” he said.

Even though progress has been delayed by the impact of coronavirus, Edwin said the company hopes to fix everything, including the assembly, by the middle of 2021.

“And then we start the commissioning process. It is a huge refinery, the commissioning process may take three to four months, and then the product coming into the market. So, by last quarter of next year, we should have our product coming into the market,” he said.

Dangote Fertiliser had announced late February that the plant had started receiving gas supply from the Nigerian Gas Company and Chevron Nigeria Limited under the Gas Sale and Purchase Agreement to supply 70 million standard cubic feet per day (Scf/d) of natural gas.

In June, the company said the mechanical completion of the fertiliser plant as well as the test phase were over and that the plant was in the commissioning phase.

The plant is expected to create thousands of direct and indirect jobs as well as provide a major boost to the agricultural sector by significantly reducing the importation of fertiliser in Nigeria.

During a tour of the facilities earlier in the year, Godwin Emefiele, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, had said the plant would be one of Nigeria’s highest foreign exchange-generating companies, raking in a minimum of $750 million through export annually.

Emefiele said the fertiliser plant would stop importation of fertilisers as about 25 percent of its products would be used for domestic consumption to boost agriculture in the country, while the remaining 75 percent would be exported.

Also in August, Muhammad Sabo Nanono, minister of agriculture, said the Dangote fertiliser plant was critical to the Federal Government’s food security quest and agricultural agenda for the country.

Nanono, during a tour of the facilities, said Aliko Dangote’s investment in fertiliser production would contribute to improved farmers’ yield per hectare and boost agricultural productivity, which are critical to the attainment of food sufficiency.

“The capacity of Dangote Fertiliser is enough to change the way fertiliser is being used in this country. We are going to complement his efforts and support him in this regard,” Nanono said.

“The challenge of the supply of fertiliser is going to be solved by the Dangote Fertiliser plant. I can now go home and sleep,” he said in a statement.