Syngenta inaugurates commercial planting of sugarcane technology

This week, Syngenta carries out the first commercial planting areas of EMERALD. The Adecoagro plant (Ivinhema, MS) will receive ten of the first commercial hectares of the new technology, which will transform the way sugarcane is planted, one of the main Brazilian crops. It is an encapsulated seedling, ready to be planted, exactly as is done in cereal crops. The technique eliminates the need for an area dedicated to seedlings, which in some units involves large areas of the production area. The product, developed at Syngenta's research and development center in Itápolis, brings healthy and vigorous vegetative tissues, encapsulated in a system covered by wax, simplifying the sugarcane planting process in all its stages.

The first commercial area is part of the more than 800 hectares of the product negotiated, in June 2019, with 25 sugar and alcohol groups, which represent 75% of the total area of ​​plants in Brazil and will be the first to test the new technology on a large scale. “Emerald simplifies all stages of production, making the process leaner, more efficient, profitable and sustainable. Investment and operating expenses are reduced by 90%”, highlights Leandro Amaral, director of the Sugarcane Business Unit at Syngenta. “We work with the main sugarcane varieties on the market. The expectation is that in 10 years artificial seeds will cover 30% of the plants’ entire planted area”, he adds.