The newly appointed Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Bayer Greater China said Tuesday he has great expectations for the Chinese market and that Bayer will expand its investment in the country.

"The greater China market, including China's mainland, Taiwan and Hong Kong, has become the second biggest market of Bayer in the Asia-Pacific region and a cornerstone of Bayer's global investment," said Jwergen Dahmer, who will take the office this July.

According to him, Bayer Greater China has 17 companies with 11 equipped with product lines. Among 12 Bayer's enterprises in the Chinese mainland, five are wholly foreign owned companies.

Dr. Elmar Stachels, the current CEO of Bayer Greater China who will retire soon, said that with the rapid growth of China's economy, the emphasis of the Chinese government on economic strategy is changing from speed to quality. More attention is being paid to reforming the unbalanced structure of China's economy.

Bayer's business in China is expanding in compliance with the development of China's economy, said Elmar Stachels.

When Bayer began business in China, textile, leather and paper making were the most prosperous industries of China. Now with the growth of new industries such as automobile, electronics and building construction and the burgeoning of health care and agriculture industries, Bayer began to focus their business on those industries, said Elmar Stachels.

According to Elmar Stachels, material science, crop science and healthcare are troika business of both Bayer Group and Bayer Greater China.

From 2003 to 2009, Bayer will invest about 1.8 billion US dollars in the Bayer integrated site at the Shanghai Chemical Industry Park, which is designed to be a major polymer material base.

According to Dahmer, the sales of Bayer Greater China in 2004 amounted to 1.1 billion euros with material science accounting for 76 percent. Healthcare and crop science accounted for 18 and 6 percent.

"China's rapid economic growth produces a large demand for materials, especially those for saving energy. But with the further social progress, there must be a great potential in the health care and agriculture market," said Dahmer.

"So Bayer Greater China aims to expand its market share in health care and crop science fields while keeping a stable growth of its materiel share," he said.

Dahmer also said that with China's access into the WTO, there will be more space for the direct sale of imported goods.

"Building up strong direct sales of Bayer Greater China represents another major mission after I take office," he said.

As one of the top 500 global enterprises and one of leading enterprises in global chemical and pharmaceutical industry, Bayer, based in Germany, saw sales of 23 billion euro in 2004.

Source: Xinhua