Aliphos, a leading producer of inorganic feed phosphates, aims to regain market leadership in Europe with their new Dunkirk plant. The plant offers flexibility in raw material use and produces high-quality Aliphos® Dical+ with improved physical characteristics. Aliphos is committed to sustainability and expanding globally, with projects in Egypt and India.
A new inorganic feed phosphate plant in Europe
Aliphos, a member of the Ecophos Group, has been producing inorganic feed phosphates for nearly a century. We have led the industry in feed phosphate production, feed phosphate quality and the development of new products. Today, we offer customers around theworld the largest range of high quality feed phosphates. Our clear goal is to regain market leadership in Europe, not only in product quality but also in installed capacity. European feed phosphate customers are highly demanding, with a great expertise in animal nutrition. They look for added-value products with the lowest environmental impact at optimum cost.
Sustainability is not just a word to Aliphos, it is part of the value we add and one of our key development criteria. The ability of our new Dunkirk plant to produce high phosphorus digestibility Aliphos® Dical+ from a variety of raw material sources is completely in line with our philosophy.The new plant has been specially designed to offer full flexibility in terms ofraw material use so as to take advantage of the best market conditions. Technology developed by Ecophos allows the plant to use alternative sources of raw materials which cannot be used in classical inorganic feed phosphate production processes. Flexibility in the choice of raw materials will be the key to our success and to us again becoming the "Number 1" feed phosphate player in Europe!
Europe is a key market for Aliphos, but we are also increasing our presence in other regions with projects in Egypt and India. We are currently on track towards our strategic objective of having 1 million tons of installed inorganic feed phosphate production capacity worldwide and being the most international producer of the highest quality products.
A new inorganic feed phosphate: why DCP?
Previously, Aliphos produced dihydrate DCP at factories in Belgium. Our product, Aliphos® Dical, was appreciated by customers all over the world for its high digestibility and purity.
Now we are adding a further “plus” to our DCP. New Aliphos® Dical+ will be a micro-granular, free flowing, dust-free product.The Ecophos technology gives us the additional advantage of improving the physical characteristics of the end product. Handling will not only be easier for us, but most of all for our customers.Aliphos strongly believes in product quality, with dihydrate DCP continuing to play an important role in the production of high quality animal feeds. This is why we have carried out a digestibility trial with Aliphos® Dical+ on poultry in Wageningen. The result obtained is 82% phosphorus digestibility - far above published values for DCP and even in line with the digestibility of MCP.
The new feed phosphate plant: why Dunkirk?
Over the past few years we have looked at many options in North West Europe for building a new feed phosphate factory. In the end, Dunkirk came out as the best solution.
The new site offers:
- Sufficient space for the feed phosphate plant with additional space available for possible extensions
- An industrial infrastructure where partners providing complimentary materials (like hydrochloric acid) can also install themselves
- Excellent logistics (by ship/barge, train or truck) for receiving raw materials and shipping finished product
- Proximity to our core markets in Europe.
- Ecophos foresees further developments at Dunkirk, both for new products aimed at the animal feed sector as well as for other applications.