Chapter 281 Start Development
In the Republic of Kolo, after Jammeh Bongo took office as president, he began to fulfill his previous promises.
The Colot government has launched negotiations with three French mining companies that own phosphate mines in the country on the distribution of interests in the mines.
In the process, they passed a resolution suspending exports from the phosphate mines owned by these companies in Colo.
In this regard, these French companies were naturally not willing to give up their interests at first.
They even put pressure on the Colo government through the French Embassy in Colo.
However, at this time, the Kolo government already had evidence of collusion between former head of state Nassin Dema and the other party, and its attitude was relatively tough in the face of pressure from France.
And in matters involving safeguarding the country's mineral interests, Kolo has also received support from international organizations including the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States.
In addition, phosphate is an important raw material and is widely used in fertilizers, food processing, detergents, metallurgy, water treatment, building materials, medicine, feed, and petrochemical industries.
As the fourth largest exporter of phosphate ore in Africa, Colo's suspension of exports to these French mining companies has also affected global phosphate ore prices.
At this time, a visiting team composed of British companies arrived in Colo, including British companies such as Argos Retail Group, Stuart Mining Group and Devonhill Ecological Agriculture Company.
This visit finally enabled these British companies to reach good results with the Colo government.
Among them, Primark clothing chain, a subsidiary of Argos retail group, will invest in setting up a factory in Colo for clothing production.
Kolo itself is a cotton-producing country. Their domestic cotton exports also account for a considerable part of their total exports, and they have a certain textile industry foundation.
In fact, not only Kolo, but many countries in Africa have been exporting large amounts of cotton. However, after exporting raw materials, they often need to import a large amount of ready-made garments. Therefore, African clothing prices are relatively expensive.
Primark Clothing Chain's investment in Colo is, on the one hand, to support the development of Colo's textile industry and to use Africa's rich raw material resources to improve Colo's textile industry chain.
At the same time, taking advantage of Kolo's low labor costs and its geographical advantage of being close to the origin of raw materials will help Primark clothing chain further reduce the cost of garment products and increase its competitiveness.
Primark clothing chain plans to start building a factory in Colo before the end of the year.
The factory aims to increase production of ready-made garments, including dresses, shirts and children's clothing, for export to international markets.
The total investment amount of the project is estimated at 25 million euros, and the United Bank for West Africa (UBWA) will provide it with a loan of 9.84 billion West African CFA francs (equivalent to 15 million euros).
According to the plan, the factory will cover an area of 3.7 hectares and create about 2,000 local jobs in Colo.
This factory will be mainly invested by the Primark apparel chain and will be operated and managed by their largest OEM factory in China. Primark holds 80% of the factory's shares.
After completion, the factory will become the largest clothing manufacturer in Kolo.
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Stuart Mining Group has obtained the mining rights of an iron ore in the plateau area. They will set up a joint venture with the state-owned National Development and Investment Company of Colo to mine this high-quality iron ore.
The joint venture, named Colo Stuart Mining Company, will be 60% owned by Stuart Mining Group and 40% by Colo National Development Investment Company.
To put it bluntly, this joint venture will be mainly operated by Stuart Mining Group.
Mining local iron ore through their experience and advanced technology.
The Kolo National Development Investment Company, which is owned by the Kolo state, simply converts the original licensing fees for iron ore mining into shares to obtain income.
I have to say that this method is more streamlined.
In addition to Stuart Mining Group, Devonshire Ecological Agriculture will also invest in Colo.
They will invest in building a factory in Colo for further processing of cash crops.
The main cash crops in Colo include coffee, cocoa beans, etc. The factory invested by Devonhill Ecological Agriculture Company will further process these products and transport them to the European market for sale.
It is also because of Colo's friendly attitude towards British-owned enterprises that they have received support from the British side. The two parties have finalized that Colo President Jamei Bongo will lead a delegation to visit the UK next month to finalize a series of cooperation and assistance agreements.
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Under the combination of these factors, after half a month of negotiations, the Colot government finally reached an agreement with three French mining companies.
Including the unreceived shares of the Nassin Dema family in three French mining companies, the three companies will take out a total of 40% of the shares of their respective local companies in Colo and hand them over to the Colo National Development Investment Company.
This means that they will sell 40% of the profits from these phosphate mines - in fact, before this, they have already given the Nassin Dema family 25% of the shares each. Calculated in this way, it is just an extra transfer. Just 15% more...
This is already easier to accept than the Colo government's initial proposal to recover more than 60% of the shares through additional penalties and redemption.
Colo National Development Investment Company will serve as the main company held by state-owned assets in certain industries in Colo and will be directly managed by the Colo Ministry of Finance.
In addition, they also established the Caulo Industry Investment Fund (CIIF).
A common interpretation is used to invest and increase the value of state-owned assets and support the development of some local enterprises.
The source of funds for the Kolo Industrial Investment Fund is part of the profits of the National Development Investment Corporation and part of it comes from state financial allocations.
It is also considered a sovereign fund of Kolo’s own country.
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Almost at the same time, the West African Group acquired the remaining 40% shares of the capital Loti Port, thus fully controlling this best port in West Africa.
And based on this, they formed the West African Ports Group.
West African Ports Group has secured a £500 million loan from Standard Chartered Bank for the expansion and renovation project at Loti Port.
Port Loti currently has two terminals. The originally built terminal only had a designed annual throughput of 400,000 tons.
Even after the second terminal opened in 1984, the annual throughput of Loti Port did not exceed 1 million.
And now, the aging and obsolete equipment of Loti Port Terminal and low carrying capacity have become factors restricting the development of the port.
You should know that Loti Port is currently the most prosperous port in West Africa, and its development speed has exceeded the ports of many countries in the region.
The current Loti Port covers an area of 900 hectares (of which the water area is 81 hectares) and can dock 8-10 cargo ships at the same time. The port has 9 warehouses with a total area of 110,000 square meters.
It is located in the center of the Gulf of Benin, with very convenient transportation. It can radiate to all countries in the Gulf of Guinea and penetrate deep into the hinterland of West Africa.
Therefore, it is not only an important commodity distribution center on the West African coast, but also a cargo transshipment point for foreign trade in inland West African countries.
The £500 million loan obtained by the West African Ports Group this time will be used to build two deep-water terminals in Loti Port and expand the original two terminals.
And the port equipment will be updated and large trucks will be added for transportation.
According to their plan, it is expected that within two years, the annual cargo throughput of Loti Port will increase from the current 1 million tons to 5 million tons.
In the end, after the completion of the new construction and reconstruction of Loti Port, it will be able to reach an annual throughput of 10 million tons, becoming the first in West Africa and the third largest port in Africa!
