Morocco Plans to Build Battery Gigafactory

Morocco’s Industry Minister Ryad Mezzour announced that the country is in talks with electric vehicle battery makers to build a factory in the country to match the existing auto industry and cobalt production, according to a report.

"We hope to sign an agreement to build a factory by the end of this year," he said in an interview, but he declined to say which companies he was negotiating with. He also did not disclose how much investment the plan would require, other than to mention that the new factory would be a "gigafactory," a word often used to describe large-scale production facilities.

Mezzour revealed that the planned electric vehicle battery factory would "provide tremendous power for the local auto industry" and would benefit from the country's availability of renewable energy and raw materials such as cobalt and phosphate.

Demand for electric vehicle batteries is growing both inside and outside Morocco, and Citroen plans to double its current EV production capacity in Morocco from 50,000 within two years, Mezzour said. Renault and Stellantis also have plants in Morocco, which have a combined annual production capacity of about 700,000 vehicles. "Our goal is to increase production capacity to 1 million units in the next three to four years," Mezzour said.

There are about 250 car manufacturers and suppliers in Morocco, and over the past seven years, the automotive sector has ranked first among the country's industrial exports, surpassing exports of phosphates. As of May this year, Morocco’s auto industry sales were $4.13 billion, up 24% year-on-year.

To increase competitiveness in the face of competition from China and India, Morocco plans to increase the proportion of locally-made components in its exported cars to 80 percent from the current 65 percent, Mezzour said. "The automotive and aerospace industries are two drivers of industrial innovation in our country," he added.

Resources: Lithium Battery Group

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