Tata Chem in JV for Jatropha seedlings marketing

MUMBAI: Tata Chemicals Tuesday said it has entered into a joint venture with Singapore-based company JOil for marketing the latter's Jatropha seedlings in India
and East Africa.

JOil is a Jatropha seedling company and has been set up by the Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory (TLL) along with some other investors.

The Tata Group company will be investing 25 million Singapore dollars for a 35 per cent stake in the joint venture over a period of four years.

"We have tied-up with TLL which is into research and development work on Jatropha and are trying to bring some fruits of their technology to India," Tata Chemicals
Managing Director Homi R Khusrokhan told reporters.

"We will have exclusive marketing rights for these seedlings in India and East Africa," he said.

TLL also has a process for rapidly replicating the seedlings through tissue culture and this technology would be available with JOil.
       

The company would set up tissue culture labs in various locations.

The advantage of the variety of seedlings developed by TLL is that it gives consistent outputs as against the ordinary one which gives variable yields, he said.
       

Tata Chemicals has done trials on Jatropha in Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Kenya and is assessing how plants grow in these climates.
       

The seeds would be available in the market in the next 12 months, he said, adding, "it would take some time to assess the commercial potential of these seedlings."
       

Jatropha is a non-edible oil with no use in food-based oil industry and does not affect the food-fuel balance. It can be grown on waste land.