The National Office of Moroccan Railways (ONCF) has received an additional €80m ($94m) of funding from the French Development Agency (AFD) for the construction of the high-speed rail line that will link its largest city Casablanca with Tangier, a port city in the north of the country.

The additional funding has brought AFD’s contribution to the project to €300m, and French companies’ contribution to more than €1bn, according to a local media report.

The high-speed line has a budget of approximately €1.8bn.

MEED understands additional funding was required as the project generated more costs than expected during construction.

Construction work on the line, which has been divided into two phases, is expected to be completed before the end of 2017.

ONCF has allocated the first four months of 2018 for testing.

The trains will have a maximum speed of 350 kilometres an hour and operate at a commercial speed of 320 kilometres an hour. The target is for the railway to carry 6 million passengers a year. Each train will have a capacity ranging from 532 to 1,064 seats.