Agricenter projects lauded as investment in future
Bayer, Helena expanding facilities
Bayer CropScience and Helena Chemical outlined their expansion projects Monday at Agricenter International to gov- ernment and business officials who said the projects show faith in Mid-South agriculture and will help the nation compete worldwide.
Bayer CropScience will invest $17 million in a large new greenhouse and other research-and- development facilities around its existing campus on Smythe Farm Road, less than a mile away from Agricenter’s Expo Center. The project will more than double the size of Bayer’s facility from 4 acres to 9 acres.
Al Balducchi, Memphis site manager for Bayer, said the facility will focus on the company’s cottonseed business, especially its FiberMax and Stoneville brands. Researchers in the new 40,000-square-foot greenhouse will use conventional and molecular breeding techniques to eventually develop new products for markets in the United States, South America and Africa.
The Memphis facility is part of an overall five-year, $9 billion commitment to research and development from Bayer CropScience, the agriculture technology division of the German aspirin maker.
Helena Chemical will expand its Agricenter campus in a $2.2 million project that will add new facilities and convert some of its existing space into offices for up
to 30 new employees in the next 10 years.
The centerpiece of Helena’s expansion is an 8,500-square-foot laboratory that will double the size of its existing lab. Helena specializes in herbicides, insecticides and fertilizers. The Agricenter lab is where chemicals like these are formulated and tested. Colliervillebased Helena employs 4,000 people around the world and 300 in Shelby County.
Agricenter board chairman Bill Gillon said the projects “show confidence in the stability of the Agricenter and agriculture in the MidSouth.”
Bayer and Helena officials said the world’s exploding population makes agriculture a smart investment as new people mean new mouths to feed and bodies to clothe.
World demand for food and fiber will double in the coming years, but farmers will be expected to plant on 30 percent fewer acres than they have today, said Tennessee agriculture commis- sioner Julius Johnson.
Memphis Mayor A C Wharton Jr. called agriculture a key to the country’s future.
“We are likely unable to maintain our influence in the world by weapons alone, but by outproducing other countries, we will be able to maintain our dominance in the world,” Wharton said. “We can outproduce any country you’ll find anywhere with less and with less land.”