FMC And DuPont Agree On Sulfertrazone Distribution In US Soybean Market

FMC Corporation's Agricultural Products Group and DuPont Company's Agricultural Enterprise have agreed to specific supply, price and volume requirements for FMC's sulfentrazone herbicide. Under the terms of the agreement, FMC will supply DuPont with sulfentrazone for its distribution and sale into the U.S. soybean market and DuPont will have exclusive use of the herbicide in this marketplace, where the product is marketed as "Authority" and "Canopy XL." The seven-year agreement takes effect for the 1999 growing season.

Bill Schumann, FMC's vice president and general manager of FMC's Agricultural Products Group, said that combining FMC's new chemistry and DuPont's herbicide chemistry, market access and biotechnology efforts would strengthen the positions of the two companies in the highly competitive soybean herbicide market. U.S. farmers planted an estimated 73 million acres of soybeans this year, making it the country's second largest harvested crop after corn.

Sulfentrazone, which obtained a U.S. registration in February 1997, is one of a new family of herbicides developed by FMC that controls a wide spectrum of weeds, including difficult-to-control species such as sedges, morning- glory, tall waterhemp, nightshade and lambsquarters.

FMC will continue to manufacture, distribute and sell sulfentrazone for use in the United States on tobacco, under the trade name "Spartan," and on sugarcane and soybeans in Brazil under the trade name "Boral."

For more information: FMC Agricultural Products, 1735 Market St., Philadelphia, PA 19103 Telephone: 215-299-6000 Fax: 215-299-5999.