Plant Impact starts field trial with Syngenta in Brazil

Plant Impact Plc, a crop nutrition and pest control company, said it started field trials in Brazil to test its technologies targeting calcium and nitrogen in plants with the worlds largest agrochemicals company Syngenta.

Plant Impact said the trials would focus on the use of its technologies, CaT -- a calcium absorption technology for plants -- and PiNT -- a nitrogen uptake system that improves plant growth, on soybean, corn, cotton and coffee.

The field trials would initially focus on 4,000 hectares of soybean utilising Brazils key soy producers, said the company, which added it considered the Brazilian agricultural market to be a "major opportunity."

Plant Impact said that on the success of these trials, it expected the initial target market for its products, through Syngenta, will include Brazilian farmers having 3 million hectares of soybean, 1 million hectares of corn, 300 thousand hectares of cotton and 300 thousand hectares of coffee per year.

The company also said that Brazilian Enterprise for Agricultural Research, a state-owned company, would conduct independent trials into Brazilian crops to further support the companys technologies.

Shares of the company, which have fallen 35.4 percent in the past year, were up 6.5 percent at 16.5 pence at 0706 GMT on the London Stock Exchange.