KWS Vegetables expands its business in Spain

Eight months after acquiring land in El Eijdo, Almería, KWS Vegetables has now acquired a 17-hectare farm in Murcia, Spain, at the heart of an important European plant breeding and cultivation area. Here KWS will also set up a new breeding station, which will focus mainly on breeding pepper, melons and watermelon varieties. Also, a phytopathology center will be developed as well as an office for the commercial activities in the region.

The recently acquired farm in Murcia, Spain.

″We have started our activities in Murcia already in 2021 in a rented facility and now we are able to expand, develop and improve our facilities with this land acquisition. This breeding site complements very well our location in Almería. Also, we will develop our phytopathology center here, which will be another step in our plan to create resistant added value varieties for the future″, says Wybe Van der Schaar, Head of Breeding Spain.

The plot is located in Miranda, Campo de Cartagena. ″The basic infrastructure is already available at this location, so we can soon start building greenhouses on this site which should be fully operational by next autumn″, Van der Schaar adds.

Already in 2020, KWS started its first breeding and commercial activities in Spain and has been continuing building up an experienced team for the market there. In February this year KWS Vegetables bought a 14.5-hectare site in El Ejido, Almeria.

Background: New business unit for vegetable seeds

KWS is one of the world’s leading plant breeding companies. With a history of 165 years in the seed industry, the company focuses on plant breeding, and the production and sale of seeds for corn, sugarbeet, cereals, rapeseed and sunflowers. In 2019, the company announced its entry into the long-term growth market for vegetable seeds, based on a greenfield approach which entails organic growth, supplemented by suitable acquisitions and the sales of licensed-in varieties.

This included the acquisition of the Dutch vegetable breeding company Pop Vriend Seeds, a very important player in spinach and beans breeding. In addition, KWS acquired the Italian vegetable seed company Geneplanta S.r.l. (now: KWS Vegetables Italia), a specialist in breeding, production and sales of tomato varieties, in March last year. In parallel, KWS has been concentrating on staffing the new business division as well as on launching its own breeding activities in Brazil, Mexico, and Turkey. The focus is on spinach, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, melons, watermelons, beans, red beet and Swiss chard.