DuPont Opens Ukrainian Seed Facility to Meet HIgh Demand.
DuPont Co . (DD), the largest U.S. chemical company by market value, is opening a seed plant in Ukraine tomorrow to meet increasing demand in the region that supplies corn and sunflower products. The facility, with a planned annual capacity of 500,000 units and the potential to expand, cost DuPont $41.5 million, Jeffrey D. Rowe, the regional director for DuPont Pioneer Europe, said in an interview in Kiev today. The central Ukrainian plant will process seeds from this year’s harvest mostly for sale to domestic customers in 2014, Rowe said. Some output may be shipped to Russia. “We feel that Ukraine is in a great position because of the location, the access to the Black Sea region, the ability to export, the ability to improve productivity on hectares that are in production right now and the ability to bring new hectares into production,” Rowe said. Ukraine is the world’s biggest supplier of sunflower seed oil and the fourth-biggest exporter of corn in the marketing year end