Forty kilometers south of Agadir, in the town of Tin Mansour, a 29-hectare industrial complex of greenhouses and 13,000 square meters of climate-controlled rooms houses the Biobest Group’s largest biofactory for pollinating bumblebees and predatory mites.
Founded in 1998 through an equal partnership between Moroccan agricultural company Azura — a leading tomato producer — and Belgian firm Biobest, the Chtouka-Aït Baha facility produces 27 species of beneficial organisms designed to replace chemical pesticides in greenhouse crops. The high-performance center operates with 380 employees, including 80 specialized engineers and technicians, and directs 98% of its turnover to international markets, mainly in Europe and the United States.
The ownership structure of this biological control center has just changed course. Industrial holding company Floridienne, which is listed on the Brussels Stock Exchange, announced that its subsidiary BioFirst has reached a definitive agreement to buy Azura’s remaining 50% stake in Biobest Maroc.
The transaction is valued at €30 million and will be financed through a combination of equity and bank debt. With the acquisition, the Belgian group will move from sharing management to assuming exclusive control of the Moroccan subsidiary, strengthening its vertical integration strategy and consolidating full control over its main biocontrol supply chain.
The Moroccan subsidiary’s financial figures explain the high level of interest from the European investor. During fiscal year 2024, Biobest Maroc recorded turnover of €17.9 million and posted net profit of approximately 43 million dirhams, or €4.3 million. The operating margin and high return on assets have made the Tin Mansour plant a priority component of Floridienne’s global strategy, with the company retaining a 59.16% stake in BioFirst after the agreement closes. The transaction allows Azura to realize value from a mature asset while focusing on its core agri-food business, transferring operational ownership of the facility to the industrial specialist that was already managing its breeding technology.
The corporate filing is in the final stage of administrative processing before the regulatory authorities of the Kingdom of Morocco. The Competition Council publicly notified the application for exclusive control by Biobest Group — an entity headquartered in Westerloo with share capital of €514.49 million — and set a deadline for third parties to submit comments.
The completion of the purchase will cement Belgian control over one of North Africa’s largest agricultural bioprotection infrastructures vis-à-vis the Canary Islands, securing a direct supply of biological inputs for the European market at a time of tight regulatory restrictions on synthetic pesticides in intensive agriculture.
The article Morocco’s tomato giant Azura sells Agadir insect factory to BioFirst was first published on canarymaritime.com.
