Hi pawel, some good questions I’ll attempt to answer, though only the company can give a definitive answer.
Firstly the MOU formula is a bit different to what you described, and yes the NPV etc is based on our 85% ownership using that pricing formula.
Table 10-2 of the DFS shows how the pricing is worked out.
TSP has 46% P2O5 compared to our 30.5%, so ours has 65.32% of TSPs content
The base case has used the 15 year average TSP price of $412/t, added $75 transport cost (to import it)
Then multiplied that by the above 65.32% and again by the RAE of 92% you mentioned.
That works out to the $292.69/t used in the DFS
At present prices we’d be getting $348.21/t compared to TSP at $504.38/t
Phosphate rock is not normally suitable as a direct fertiliser as it’s not very soluble which is one reason superphosphates are generally used. We are lucky ours is a high grade sedimentary deposit unlike the Moroccan hard rock. Ours is also perfectly suited to the Angolan acid soils, is soluble and lasts 3 seasons compared to just 1 season for TSP. So not only is our product cheaper than TSP it works for longer. So to answer the 2nd part of your question, just importing Moroccan phosphate for example just wouldn’t work. In any case under Presidential decree they’d have to buy from us anyway, and our product is significantly cheaper than TSP.
I don’t know what the holdup with the offtake is, I doubt it’d be pricing which was agreed on & others like Biocom, SARIS are happy to pay. Since that binding MOU the trials have actually surprised on the upside, especially the fact it lasts at least 3 seasons, so there’d be an argument to increase the price, not reduce it.
Your last question, Phosphate rock is quoted at $152/t, just like oil not all Phosphate rocks are the same, we’d get a premium for ours as it’s low in heavy metals and fairly soluble. The latest quoted cost of production for our BPR was $117/t that’s landed including transport & including processing, we’d get a premium for our DSO phosphate on the $152/t and even more if we put it through our plant. So yes, it would be economic.
