BEIJING (Reuters) - A year on from Syngenta’s $43 billion purchase by ChemChina, the seed and chemical giant is leveraging its new status as a Chinese company to grow its tiny share of the highly fragmented China market.
Andrew Guthrie, Regional Director of Syngenta China, poses for a portrait at his China headquarters in Beijing, China July 16, 2018. Picture taken July 16, 2018. REUTERS/Jason Lee
The former Swiss firm is targeting growth through acquisitions in the $17 billion Chinese seed market, where access is restricted for foreign players, as well as new products and collaborations in technology.
It hopes its edge in the world’s second-biggest farm inputs market will help it catch bigger global rivals in seeds, Monsanto and DowDuPont in the wake of a round of consolidation in the agricultural products sector.
“Over time, we want to challenge into being in the number two position [in seeds],” Andrew Guthrie, Syngenta’s regional director for China told Reuters in an interview, with the firm currently a “distant number three” in seed sales globally.
The firm, the global leader in crop chemicals, also aims to grow its chemicals business in China, where it currently has about 7 percent of the market and is one of market leaders.
China represented only 2.8 percent of total group sales in the first half, but was the fastest growing region by sales, up 14 percent to $201 million, results published on Tuesday showed. bit.ly/2LQuX6I
Business was driven by stronger sales of crop protection and vegetable seeds, it said.
The acquisition of Syngenta, China’s biggest foreign takeover to date, came as Beijing looks to new technology to boost farm productivity, as well as reduce the use of chemicals on heavily polluted soil.
That has already driven
