PhosAgro launches new fertilizer complex in Volkhov at cost of 34 bln rubles

ST. PETERSBURG. March 6 (Interfax) - PhosAgro , a major Russian fertilizer producer, launched a new mineral fertilizer production complex at its division in Volkhov, Leningrad Region on Tuesday, an Interfax correspondent reported from the opening ceremony.

President Vladimir Putin took part in the launch of the complex by video conferencing.

"The plant was built by Russian contractors using domestic technologies. [...] This is the capstone of the company's ten-year investment cycle," PhosAgro CEO Mikhail Rybnikov said at the ceremony.

The project cost more than 34 billion rubles and it took four years to deliver. In the course of modernizing the plant in Volkhov, the company built new facilities to produce phosphoric acid using the wet process and water-soluble mineral fertilizers, as well as new storage facilities.

As a result, production of finished product at the plant will quadruple compared to 2019 to 1 million tonnes per year, PhosAgro said. Processing of apatite concentrate, the main raw material for producing phosphate fertilizer, will quintuple compared to 2019 to 1.5 million tonnes.

Following the modernization, the Volkhov complex began to produce fertilizers such as monoammonium phosphate (MAP), as well as the new product water-soluble ammonium phosphate, which is used in greenhouses. The project, which also included the construction of a sulfuric acid production line, created 330 jobs, PhosAgro said.

PhosAgro Group includes JSC Apatit in Cherepovets, Vologda Region, its branches in Kirovsk, Murmansk Region, Balakovo, Saratov Region and Volkhov; PhosAgro Region LLC; and the Samoilov Fertilizer and Insectofungicide Research Institute.