Cameroon Plans CFA51.7bn Loan for New CDC Rubber and Palm Oil Plants

The Cameroonian government is preparing to sign two loan agreements worth a total of CFA51.7 billion with Standard Chartered Bank London. The financing packages, valued at CFA47 billion and CFA4.7 billion, will fund the construction of two industrial units for rubber processing and palm oil production for the Cameroon Development Corporation (CDC), the state-owned agribusiness operating banana, rubber, and oil palm plantations in the South-West and Littoral regions.

The information appears in the public debt report for end-September 2025 published by the Autonomous Sinking Fund (CAA). The document notes that two decrees signed on September 22, 2025, by President Paul Biya authorize the Minister of Economy, Alamine Ousmane Mey, to contract the loans on behalf of the Cameroonian state, the sole shareholder of the CDC.

The bank financing, now being finalized, comes as the company undergoes a recovery process marked by the settlement of its social debt. On September 17, 2025, following an agreement between the government and a pool of local banks, CFA15.7 billion in salary arrears owed to CDC employees was cleared. These arrears were part of a larger CFA35.7 billion debt accumulated between 2018 and 2022.

An initial payment of CFA20 billion had already been made in June 2024, according to Finance Minister Louis Paul Motazé. Soon after, CFA24.1 billion in outstanding social security contributions was paid, while the CDC’s tax debt, estimated at CFA31.8 billion, was taken over by the state and incorporated into the company’s capital. With the financial restructuring now completed, the shareholder is shifting its focus to industrial capacity expansion through the two new planned factories.

Once a flagship of Cameroon’s agro-industry, the CDC— the country’s second-largest employer after the public administration—saw its financial situation worsen in 2018, two years after separatist unrest broke out in the South-West and North-West regions. The movement targeted employees, facilities, and equipment belonging to the state-owned company.

Between 2019 and 2021, the CDC recorded CFA38.7 billion in losses and cut its workforce by more than one-third, from 22,000 to about 15,000 employees, according to the Public Enterprises Rehabilitation Commission (CTR), recently absorbed into the National Investment Company (SNI). The investments undertaken by the state in recent years aim to revive this strategic company, which remains both a major employer and a key player in Cameroon’s agricultural sector.

Tags: Production, palm oil, agreements, rubber, Cameroon