Alyaksandr Lukashenka said he was ready to implement a major trilateral project to produce mineral fertilizers together with Algeria and Oman. He announced this after talks with Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune.
According to Lukashenka, Algeria and Oman have developed close partnership relations, which creates favourable conditions for such cooperation.
“We have known the Sultan of Oman for 20 years. And, as many have noted, we have good relations,” the press service quoted him as saying. “A very interesting idea has emerged. The president said that in the near future he will have so many phosphates that he will have nowhere to put them. And we know how to produce phosphate fertilizers. We produce a huge amount of nitrogen fertilizers. Algeria, for example, is a country that holds leading positions in the extraction and export of natural gas. A country that is part of OPEC. That means it produces a huge amount of oil. But if there is gas, then there is nitrogen fertilizer.”
Lukashenka proposed creating a joint venture in Oman.
“We have a large amount of potash fertilizers. And once their own phosphates [in Algeria] appear, fertilizers can and should be produced from them. We have technologies for all types of mineral fertilizers.
We can build in that same Oman (a crossroads of all trade routes) an enterprise for the three of us, as I told the president. After investing, we can build a facility using established technologies. It will produce a huge volume of mineral fertilizers needed both in Algeria and in the region, especially in Africa,” he said.
In Lukashenka’s view, such a project would help strengthen food security on the African continent.
“Without fertilizers and technologies this is impossible, so this is our domain. And in this direction we can cooperate perfectly,” he said.
According to him, the Algerian president expressed interest in building joint enterprises for the production of tractors and vehicles.
“This is our domain. We are ready to work here. Competitors will hardly challenge us in terms of price and quality,” Lukashenka assured. “We are ready to share technologies with you. To supply equipment for these technologies and to produce the relevant machinery together. And to train your people, if necessary, in these technologies.”
He said Algeria, in particular, has a strong need for Belarusian agricultural machinery and farming technologies, because without them it is also impossible to resolve food security issues.
He also noted that Algeria is interested in producing dairy and meat products.
“This is our domain. We can always cooperate and have already begun to do so,” Lukashenka said.
He considers education another promising area of cooperation. Algeria graduates a large number of specialists from its universities every year, and doctors from this country make up a very large share of medical personnel in France.
“That says it all. It was not in vain that they fought against French colonialism,” he said.
