SWISS agrichemicals giant Syngenta Group is rapidly expanding its rollout of farm services in China ahead of a huge stock market listing, as it seeks to meet surging demand from farmers crucial to China’s increasing focus on food security.

The world’s biggest crop-protection maker and No. 3 seed supplier says it is boosting grain yields and raising farmers’ incomes just as the pandemic fuels government worries about food supplies and pushes up the cost of key farm materials.

That means opportunity for Syngenta to grab market share in a fragmented farm chemicals market, positioning the company for growth as Chinese farmers expand their holdings.

The group aims to raise US$10 billion by listing in Shanghai in what is likely to be the year’s biggest market flotation.

But Syngenta acknowledges it “faces tremendous competition in the markets in which it operates.” Rivals include Bayer AG and Corteva Inc., as well Chinese firms selling agronomy services to the nation’s farmers.

“Before, we sold pesticides, seeds and fertilizer. Now, we’re a farm services company — we sell service and technology,” said Mao Feng, chief brand manager for Syngenta Group China’s Modern Agriculture Platform (MAP) and digital agriculture.

MAP is to receive some 12 percent of the IPO proceeds for expansion, according to a prospectus filed Friday.

“Selling individual products, we had hit the ceiling, there was no more room,” Mao told reporters last month.

In China, crop yields lag far behind Western countries, even as growers use three times as much fertilizer, while farms in the vast country are tiny by global standards, averaging half a hectare, compared with 180 hectares in the United States.

So Syngenta is trying to help itself by helping farmers like Liu Ligang. Liu, who farms 20 hectares in Wei County in northern China’s Hebei, has doubled his contracted land over the past four years, one of a growing number of farmers seeking to become professional growers. To date, 37 million hectares have been contracted out, some 30 percent of China’s arable land.

Such expansion brings more risk for farmers, requiring more knowledge and sophisticated services.

Liu has just harvested some 7,500 kg of wheat per hectare (6,600 pounds per acre), up 25 percent from last year and 10 percent above his neighbors, he says, thanks to Syngenta’s MAP service, which helped him manage pests.

“Before, it was only when the disease came that the pesticide was started,” he said. “That is too late, and it can be advanced now.”

In addition to supplying seeds and chemicals, MAP runs training centers across China and about 900 demonstration farms showing growers what produces the best yields in a given location. Farmers get free management of their land, and in return buy the firm’s products or others recommended by its agronomists.

MAP tripled its revenues to more than US$280 million in the first quarter from a year earlier, adding 40 centers to reach 365 nationwide. It contributed 4 percent of group revenues, up from 1 percent in the same period a year earlier.

The business also makes money by selling crops and fresh produce to such customers as Alibaba Group’s Hema supermarkets and Dole Food Co. They pay above-market prices for MAP farmers’ quality and the traceability of its digital platform.

Revenues are expected to break US$1 billion this year and hit some US$4.5 billion by 2025, according to one industry estimate.

But other companies are also trying to capitalize on the increasing scale and sophistication of Chinese farming. Bayer, for example, is advertising for a China head of “digital agriculture.” (SD-Agencies)