Acreage Forecasts
SmartStax corn seed will be planted on as many as 4 million acres in 2010, its first year on the market, with a potential for as many as 65 million acres in the U.S. eventually, the company said. The new seed boosts yields 5 percent to 10 percent compared with other products, partly by reducing the amount of land that must be planted with conventional corn to 5 percent from 20 percent, Monsanto said.
Pricing for SmartStax is at the high end of expectations, Laurence Alexander, a New York-based analyst at Jefferies & Co., said by telephone.
You see, Dow Ag is already growing earnings 15%+ a year without this product. This is a product, it needs to be noted, that has every making in no uncertain terms of a blockbuster. It is a JV with Monsanto so it has the selling/marketing and research arms of two multi-billion dollar companies behind it.
It also has the EPA's blessing and has been shown to improve yields for farmers 5%-10%, which is huge. Here is a .pdf of the Monsanto/Dow announcement from 2007.
Look for more color on sales in Q4 2009 and Q1 2010. It is gonna be big... unless we somehow find more farmland or need to feed less people.
