Syngenta

Syngenta AG

Type	Aktiengesellschaft
Traded as	SIX: SYNN NYSE: SYT
Industry	Chemicals
Founded	2000
Headquarters	Basel, Switzerland
Key people	Martin Taylor (Chairman) Michael Mack (CEO)
Products	Seeds, pesticides, flowers
Revenue	US $14.202 billion (2012)[1]
Operating income	US $2.292 billion (2012)[1]
Profit	US $1.872 billion (2012)[1]
Total assets	US $17.24 billion (end 2011)[2]
Total equity	US $7.503 billion (end 2011)[2]
Employees	26,000 (end 2011)[2]
Website	syngenta.com

Syngenta AG is a large global Swiss specialized chemicals company which markets seeds and pesticides. Syngenta is involved in biotechnology and genomic research. The company was ranked third in total seeds and biotechnology sales in 2009 in the commercial market.^[3] Sales in 2010 were approximately US$ 11.6 billion. Syngenta employs over 27,000 people in over 90 countries. Syngenta is listed on both the Swiss stock exchange and in New York.^[2]

History

Based in Basel, Switzerland, Syngenta was formed in 2000 by the merger of Novartis Agribusiness and Zeneca Agrochemicals.^[4][5] Its roots are considerably older.

Novartis was formed of the 1995 merger of the three Swiss companies:^{[citation needed]} Geigy, which has roots back to 1758;^[6] Sandoz Laboratories which was founded in 1876;^{[citation needed]} and Ciba, founded in 1884.^{[citation needed]} Ciba and Geigy had merged in 1971 and had concentrated mainly on crop protection in its agro division,^{[citation needed]} Sandoz more on seeds.^{[citation needed]}

A Syngenta works in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire originally owned by ICI.

Zeneca Agrochemicals was part of AstraZeneca, and formerly of Imperial Chemical Industries. ICI was formed in the UK in 1926. Two years later, work began at the Agricultural Research Station at Jealott’s Hill near Bracknell.^{[citation needed]}

In 2004, Syngenta Seeds purchased Garst, the North American corn and soybean business of Advanta, as well as Golden Harvest.^[7][8] On December 5, 2004, the European Union ended a six-year moratorium when it approved imports of two varieties of genetically modified corn sold by Monsanto and its Swiss rival, Syngenta.^[9]

In 2005, Syngenta opposed a Swiss ban on genetically engineered organisms.^[10] On November 28, 2005, Swiss supported a five-year-ban on the farming of genetically modified crops, underscoring the problems facing the European Commission and biotech companies like Syngenta, Bayer and Monsanto as they try to overcome consumer doubts about safety.^[11]

In 2007, Syngenta's Canadian division was named one of Canada's Top 100 Employers, as published in Maclean's magazine, one of only a handful of agribusiness firms to receive this honour.^[12]

Syngenta finances the Syngenta Foundation for Sustainable Agriculture. This non-profit organization supports sustainable food security projects in a number of countries.^{[citation needed]}

Some of Syngenta's main competitors are: Monsanto Company, BASF, Dow AgroSciences, Bayer CropScience and DuPont.^{[citation needed]}

Products

Syngenta has eight primary product lines.^{[citation needed]} The company develops, markets and sells these worldwide:

Pesticides:

• Selective Herbicides
• Non-selective Herbicides
• Fungicides
• Insecticides
• Professional Products

Seeds:

• Field Crops
• Vegetables
• Flowers

Syngenta's field crops include both hybrid seeds and genetically engineered seeds, some of which enter the food chain and become part of genetically modified food. According to Syngenta, in the US their "proprietary triple stack corn seeds expanded to represent around 25 percent of units sold." ^[13] In 2010 the US EPA granted registration approval for insecticidal trait stacks including Syngenta's AGRISURE VIPTERA™ gene, which offers resistance to certain corn pests.^[13] Syngenta also cross-licenses its proprietary genes with Dow AgroSciences and thus is able to include Dow's Herculex®1 I and Herculex® RW insect resistance traits in its seeds.^[13] It also sells a VMAX® soybean that is resistant to glyphosate herbicide.^[13]

In 2003, more than half of Syngenta sales came from herbicides and fungicides.^{[citation needed]}

Key Syngenta brands include Aatrex (atrazine), Actara, Amistar (azoxystrobin), Callisto, Cruiser (TMX, Thiamethoxam), Daconil (Chlorothalonil), DualGold, Golden Harvest, Garst, Lumax (a selective herbicide), Northrup-King (NK), Rogers, S&G, Gramoxone (paraquat), and Vigor (TMX, Thiamethoxam).^{[citation needed]}

The insecticide TMX (Thiamethoxam)is a second-generation neonicotinoid patented by Syngenta.^{[citation needed]}

Biofuels

Like many ag-companies, Syngenta also works in the bio-fuel space.^{[citation needed]}

In 2007, Queensland University in Australia contracted with Syngenta to research different inputs for biofuels as a renewable energy source.^[14]

Board of directors

Syngenta is led by Chairman Michel Demaré. The other Directors are Vinita Bali, Stefan Borgas, Gunnar Brock, David Lawrence, Michael Mack (CEO), Eleni Gabre-Madhin, Eveline Saupper, Jacques Vincent, and Jürg Witmer^[15]

Current products

A series of fatalities due to accidental consumption of the company’s herbicide, Gramoxone (Paraquat) occurred in the 1960s. Because the product was used in a number of suicides during the 1970s and 1980s, blue dye, foul odor, and a powerful emetic were added to discourage misuse.^{[citation needed]}

Atrazine has been banned in several Wisconsin counties in the United States and in the European Union.^{[citation needed]} There has been controversy over atrazine's effects on amphibians^[16] but the EPA has concluded "that atrazine does not adversely affect amphibian gonadal development".^[17]

The European Commission decided to suspend use of the company's insecticide Cruiser (TMX, Thiamethoxam) on crops pollinated by bees.^[18] Syngenta together with Bayer is challenging this ban in court. ^[19]

Former products

Syngenta's predecessor, Ciba-Geigy, introduced the insecticide Galecron chlordimeform in 1966, and it was removed from the market in 1988.^[20] In 1976, Ciba-Geigy told regulatory authorities that it was temporarily withdrawing chlordimeform because ongoing long-term toxicology studies - particularly studies to determine if long-term exposure could cause cancer - showed that it was causing cancer, and that it has already started to monitor its workers' exposure and had found chlordimeform and its metabolites in the urine of its workers.^[21]:8–9 Ciba-Geigy then applied for, and was granted, permission to market Galecron at lower doses for use only on cotton.^[22] However as further long term monitoring data was obtained, regulators banned chlordimeform in 1988. In a 1995 class action in the US, Ciba-Geigy agreed to cover costs for employee health monitoring and treatment. In 2005, Syngenta reported that employee health monitoring was continuing at the company's Monthey, Switzerland site ^[23]

Litigation

In 2001, the United States Patent and Trademark Office ruled in favor of Syngenta when the company filed suit against Bayer to protect its patent on a class of neonicotinoid insecticides.

The following year Syngenta filed suit against Monsanto and a number of other companies claiming infringement of its U.S. biotechnology patents covering transgenic corn and cotton. In 2004, the company again filed suit against Monsanto, claiming antitrust violations related to the U.S. biotech corn seed market, and Monsanto countersued. Monsanto and Syngenta settled all the litigation in 2008.^[24]

Syngenta was defendant in a class action lawsuit concerning the the adverse effects of Atrazine in human water supplies. The suit was settled for 105 million dollars in May 2012.^[25] A similar case involving six states is currently in federal court.^[26][27]

Brazil

On 21 October 2007, a Brazilian peasant organization, the Landless Workers' Movement (Portuguese: Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra - MST), led a group of landless farmers in an occupation of one of the company's seed research farms, in protest against genetically-engineered ("genetically modified") vegetables and in hopes of obtaining land for landless families to cultivate. After the occupation had begun, a team from NF Security arrived in a minibus and a fight with gunfire ensued. A protestor and a security guard were killed, and some protesters and security guards were wounded.^[28]

The Brazilian police investigation completed in November 2007 blamed the confrontation and death of the protestor on nine employees and the owner of NF Security; the leader of MST was blamed for trespassing. The inquiry found that the protester was fatally shot in the abdomen and in the leg. The security guard was shot in the head. Eight others were injured, five of them landless.^[29]

The Civil Court of Cascavel granted an order for the repossession of the site on December 20, 2007^[30] and on June 12, 2008, the remaining MST members left the Santa Teresa site they had been occupying.^[31] On October 14, 2008, Syngenta donated the 123-hectare station to the Agronomy Institute of Paraná (IAPAR) for research into biodiversity, recovery of degraded areas and agriculture production systems, as well as environmental education programs.^[32]

Lobbying in the US

Syngenta's contributions to US federal candidates, parties, and outside groups totaled $267,902 during 2012, ranking it 10th on the list of companies in its sector.^[33] Its lobbying expenditures in the US during 2012 were $1,150,000, ranking it 7th in its sector.^[34]

Farmers Support Team

Syngenta sponsors several agricultural programs in developing nations. SFI created its flagship program, the Farmer Support Team (FST). The FST is a nationwide program in the Philippine archipelago. It works with farmers in all the major rice, fruit, and vegetable production provinces of the country. It began by helping Filipino farmers gain greater understanding and achieve higher productivity through trainings in Integrated Pest Management (IPM), Integrated Crop Management (ICM) and Total Crop Management (TCM).

Syngenta Foundation

The objectives and goals of the Syngenta Foundation are "to work with rural communities in the semiarid regions of the world and improve their livelihoods."^[35]

The Syngenta Foundation addressed the World Food Day Symposium in 2005 as an output of the Millennium Ecosystem Report.^[36]

Awards and community involvement

In October 2008, Syngenta Crop Protection Canada, Inc. was recognized as one of Waterloo Area's Top Employers, as announced in the Waterloo Region Record, Guelph Mercury and Cambridge Times.^[37] In 2011, Syngenta was named among the top 10 employers in biotechnology by Science magazine.^[38] The company was also recognized by the 2011 Dow Jones Sustainability Index (DJSI) as one of the best performing chemical companies worldwide. Syngenta was one of only five chemical companies in the World and Europe indices based on economic, social and environmental performance.^[39]

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Syngenta.

• Official website

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