BASF Sees Asia Driving $8.25 Billion in Crop Protection Sales by 2020
15 November 2011 BASF expects its crop protection sales to reach $8.25 billion in sales by 2020, up nearly 50% from 2010 levels of $5.56 billion, boosted by emerging markets, the company said at a Nov. 8 press conference at its Ludwigshafen, Germany headquarters.
Markus Heldt, President of BASF’s Crop Protection division, said China and India are the top potential markets for growth over the next decade. This means it will focus efforts on insecticides in a move to round out its fungicide- and herbicide-dominated crop protection business.
“[The focus on] China, for us, is insecticides. Asia is very much an insecticide-dominated market — not necessarily our core strength — so that’s up to me to fix over the next couple of years. We will have a more balanced portfolio,” Heldt told Farm Chemicals International in an interview at the conference.
BASF, one of the big 6 agrichemical companies, pegged crop protection sales for Asia at $1.38 billion by 2020. It also said it is on track to double sales in Africa by the end of this year from 2008, when it began investing in the continent.
Crop protection is BASF’s smallest business, accounting for about 6% of the company’s $88 billion in sales in 2010, and has been a strong performer among the company’s six units. Crop protection commands the largest portion of its R&D budget at 26% (and growing), or the equivalent of about $1.38 million a day.
Separately, BASF spends upwards of $204 million a year on its biotech R&D. Its Plant Sciences business develops yield and stress traits, as well as nutritionally enhanced GM products, such as a heart-healthy canola plant that produces oil containing high levels of EPA/DHA Omega-3 fatty acids.
Editor’s note: Read FCI’s exclusive interview with BASF’s head of global crop protection Markus Heldt as he discusses the future of research, crop protection trends, commodity prices, glyphosate and its highly praised new fungicide, Xemium.
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