Xingfa sets sights on $2bn Egypt phosphate build as it lifts home-mine scale

China’s Xingfa Chemicals Group is planning to invest $2bn in a three-phase project for phosphate ore exploration, extraction and downstream production in Egypt’s Golden Triangle Economic Zone, according to Egypt’s Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources. The ministry said the project would progress once a memorandum of understanding is finalised, alongside technical exchanges and feasibility work.

Petroleum minister Karim Badawi said the proposed investment aligns with Egypt’s push to expand value-added industries based on its mineral resources and attract technologically advanced companies. He also linked the initiative to a wider economic development agenda in which the energy sector, including mining, is positioned as a priority area.

Xingfa has also been strengthening its upstream phosphate position at home. In a Shanghai exchange filing dated 11 February 2026, the company said a wholly owned grand-subsidiary had completed a mining-rights change and secured updated mining documentation for the Qiaogou phosphate mine, lifting the mine’s designed production scale to 2.8m t/y from 2.0m t/y, with the mining license valid until 22 June 2055.

In the same filing, the company said the change would “enhance… resource security” and “strengthen… the integrated industry chain”, underscoring the supply-security logic behind its phosphate expansion plans.