DuPont India to focus on pro-biotics, formulations

DuPont, the agri and chemicals giant, plans to launch at least three new products in the crop protection area in the next three years in India, which includes an insecticide and a couple of fungicides.

The Delaware, US-based company, which invests about $11 billion of its turnover of $32 billion in agri-nutrition, sees huge opportunity in the Indian market and to also play a significant role in India's quest to increase productivity of various crops.

Mr Jim Borel, Executive Vice-President, told newspersons that at least 6 crop protection products were launched in the last two years, including Coragen (insect control) which was a global launch.

With a local formulation in granular form developed in India, the product now is used in more than 6 million acres of rice and sugarcane crop.

The DuPont Knowledge Centre (DKC) at Hyderabad will see lot of rice-centric research, especially hybrid rice as well as development of molecular markers using biotechnology methods. The Centre will have a strength of 500 by year-end and is already playing a big role in the company's global research strategy, he said. On Genetic Engineering, he said the focus was on improving traits and developing molecular markers that can facilitate dramatic improvements.

Recently, the company launched a drought-tolerant corn in the US market. Soyabean modified to contain high percentage of olieac acid has also been introduced.

Referring to the food and nutrition area, Mr Borel said after the acquisition of Danisco, the Danish pro-biotics and sweetener company, DuPont is on the way to expanding into the food business, especially in health and wellness foods.

Danisco has a presence in India. Interestingly, DuPont India is working with a few food companies and nutrition institutes to make ‘healthy, guilt-free snacks', said Mr Ram Mudholkar, Business Director, South Asia and Asean, DuPont Crop Protection.