NIGERIA - Fertilisers.

The National Fertiliser Co. of Nigeria (NAFCON) has four plants at Onne, Rivers State, producing 1.2 million t/y of urea and ammonia. This is below their design capacity - 750,000 t/y of ammonia and 1.1m t/y of urea. The first urea and ammonia plants were commissioned in 1988 as a JV with M.W. Kellogg. The other two plants went on stream in 1997 at the cost of about $500m.

However, these plants were defective and both were closed for repairs in late 1997 and early 1998. They went back on stream in April 1998, though they could only operate at a part of their capacity. The plants lacked advanced equipment as NAFCON could not pay for what the contractors required.

Related facilities at the new plants include a unit producing nitrogen, a high-pressure carbonate condenser and a 25 MW gas turbine generator.

There is strong demand for fertilisers in this country, where the majority of the people are farmers. Nigeria's population has grown to about 150 million.

From the government's perspective, building a new complex with major fertilisers plants should also ease pressure from international organisations to make better use of the country's huge reserves of natural gas.

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