On Wednesday February 16, 2022, the Citic Dicastal Group kicked off the construction of its new industrial unit within the Atlantic Free Zone of Kenitra (AFZ), in the presence of the Minister of Industry and the Commerce, Ryad Mezzour, the Governor of the province of Kenitra, Fouad M’Hamdi, the Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China to Morocco, Li Changlin, and the Vice-President and General Manager of Dicastal Morocco Africa, Badr Lahmoudi.
With an overall investment of 1.8 billion dirhams, this project aims to set up the Chinese group’s third factory in Morocco, specializing in the molding and machining of aluminum chassis components, with a production capacity of 10 million of units, which will enable the creation of 766 qualified direct jobs.
Spread over an area of 20,000m² in a plot of 12 hectares, this project called “Dika Morroco Castings – DMC” will provide Morocco, in six months, with its first production plant for cast aluminum components for powertrains. and the frames. A state-of-the-art factory, which is part of a sustainable ecological approach, powered by green electricity generated from renewable energies present in Morocco.
This large-scale project, which now strengthens the presence of the Chinese giant in the Kingdom, was the subject of an agreement signed, on the occasion, between the Minister of Industry and the Vice-President of Citic Dicastal, Xu Zuo, by videoconference from China.
“The partnership that binds us to the Dicastal group is a real success. Today, we are celebrating the launch of work on the group’s 3rd factory in Morocco. With this new large-scale project, which positions Morocco in a high-tech industry, the confidence of investors in the quality of our industrial platform and its international competitiveness, but also its resilience to any test “, said Ryad Mezzour, on the occasion. And to underline: “the sector continues to ramp up its skills and the cutting-edge technologies implemented. We will continue on this momentum by providing strong and unwavering support for investments that create jobs and value, for an ever more competitive and efficient national automotive industry”.
For his part, Badr Lahmoudi recalled that this new investment comes in “a period of fragile and unstable global economic recovery under the permanent threat of the Covid 19 health crisis and its new variants and its consequences on the world economy. The Citic Dicastal group wants to be optimistic by taking this courageous and ambitious decision to reinvest in Morocco, again attesting that our country enjoys an economic climate of confidence, a geo-strategic situation, good infrastructures and a quality human capital.
As a reminder, the Citic Dicastal group inaugurated two aluminum rim manufacturing plants on June 26, 2019 and December 20, 2020. This rim project, which required an investment of 3.5 billion dirhams, enabled the creation of 1,200 jobs for an annual capacity of 6 million rims.
The first “Made in Morocco” aluminum rim was produced in record time in April 2019 in just 7 months.
Citic Dicastal is a Chinese equipment manufacturer specializing in the casting and production of aluminum automotive parts, including rims. The group also produces a full line of lightweight cast aluminum components for powertrains and chassis.
The Dicastal group employs 17,000 people across 26 production units spread across Europe, North America and China, with an annual production capacity of 70 million rims and 90,000 tonnes of lightweight components. Dicastal supplies the majority of car manufacturers such as GM, Toyota, Renault, Stellantis, Volkswagen, BMW, Audi, etc.
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