France: Addoha Group's plant draws right-wing opposition

The CEO of Addoha Group, Anas Sefrioui, could see his Fos-sur-Mer cement plant project permanently held up due to local political contingencies.

in 2012 Groupe Sefrioui, through its subsidiary Sudvrac, started a project to build a cement plant, near the port of Fos-Sur-Mer, some 50km from Marseille. The EUR50m project is expected to produce 0.4Mta of cement and create more than 100 jobs.

However, the project has faced significant opposition with the town hall repeatedly requesting public hearings. Now the project has become a debating point picked up by the right-wing National Front (FN) party ahead of next year's elections.

"For several months, the employees of the cement factories Vicat - Lafarge - Calcia, in Fos-sur-Mer, are fighting against the project to install a new cement factory by the Sefrioui group, headed by the Moroccan Anas Sefrioui. If this project comes to fruition, it would endanger the French cement industry and threaten hundreds of jobs in our region," declared the FN in a statement.

"The Sefrioui plant will not use raw material (clinker) extracted in France, but coming from Morocco. Thus, French environmental and social standards will not apply throughout the production process, particularly during the most polluting phase, extraction. These products will be imported at very low cost, generating a low price for the cement thus manufactured. The extraction sites around Fos-sur-Mer and in the Haut-Pays Niçois would be rendered useless by the new cement complex," adds the FN statement.

"The employees of Vicat - Lafarge - Calcia and the hundreds of other employees threatened, can count on the mobilisation of the elected National Front to defend them by all possible means," continues the statement.