Following the signing of the Madrid Accords on November 14, 1975 and also the departure of Spanish colonial troops in 1976, the Western Sahara was geographically divided between Morocco and Mauritania [1].  This was motivated in part by Spain´s desire to suppress the Polisario (Popular Front for the Liberation of Saquia el-Hambra and Río de Oro), a movement which established itself in Western Sahara most definitively during the rebellion of 1973-1975. What ensued thereafter was a bitter conflict between Morocco and the Polisario is dominated by Western Sahara´s indigenous peoples the Saharawi, which today may number in the 80 thousands [2]. A ceasefire was declared in 1991, and with the support of a UN peace keeping mission (MINURSO, 1985) has tentatively held, yet a long-awaited referendum is still the main demand of the Saharawi (SADR) people, and sovereignty disputes have continued throughout the territory, including a 20,000–strong protest camp near Laayoune in October 2010, which resulted in 2,400 people arrested.   The Moroccan-claimed territory was separated physically from the eastern Polisario Front through the construction of a wall or berm in the 1980s. The berm is reinforced by five million land mines, which have been placed along the 2,400 kilometer extension along with 60,000 Moroccan soldiers stationed there. The resulting small territorial band at the east of Western Sahara is controlled by the SADR, while the remaining area of Western Sahara (two-thirds of the territory) is controlled by Morocco, who treats de facto the territory as its province du sud.  Morocco controls and administers 75% of the territory (15% of which was ceded by Mauritania in 1979) and the some 200,000 or more Moroccan settlers that crossed and settled into the territory during the Green March in 1975 in Western Sahara [1,3]. The natural resource-poor eastern side of the territory is administered by the Polisario, while the Sahrawi people across the territory continue to oppose Moroccan domination and exploitation of resources, demanding the Sahrawi people’s right to self-determination.  A referendum vote for self-determination within the territory has been pending since the end of the colonial period, but has become significantly more complex with ensuing conflicts and the high numbers of Moroccan settlers. The most recent UN-sponsored peace talks were held in February 2010 in New York.  Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara contains high quality phosphorous (from Fosboucraa). Morocco also has reserves of phosphates, larger than those in Western Sahara, yet continues to exploit the SADR phosphates despite the dispute, which fuels contention.  Despite the illegality of the annexation of Western Saharan land and natural resources, the Moroccan phosphate industry is flourishing, concentrated in the area of Boucra and under the control of two industries owned and operated by the Moroccan state OCP SA and Phosphates de Boucraa SA. A large conveyor belt, 97 kilometers long, transports nearly 2 million tons per year of phosphates from the deposits in Boucra, out to the harbor where the phosphate rock is washed, dried, stockpiled, and shipped over to vessels waiting to be loaded at El Aaiun port. 

Income from all phosphates sold in Morocco and Western Sahara is estimated at 1.7 billion USD per year which is 6% of the country´s GDP, and the country´s Office chérifien des phosphates (OCP) is the second largest producer and first exporter of phosphate in the world. Based on 2014 numbers [4], PhosBoucraa in Western Sahara produces 10% of the phosphate of the total OCP, and the OCP has the intention to double its production by 2020. Yet, the company´s website states that Phosboucraa produces only 1.6% of Morocco´s total reserves of phosphorus. A report of the Western Sahara Resource Watch [4], the total volume of phosphorous exported from Western Sahara in 2015 included 1.41 million tons estimated at a value of US $167.8 million, which according to the report was a decline from the 2014 exports.