China's COFCO, Sinopec to develop corn-based chemical product

COFCO, China's leading food items producer, will work with Sinopec Group, the country's largest oil refiner, to manufacture polylactic acid from corns in China's northeastern Jilin province.

Li Jiuren, an official with COFCO, said the two companies have jointly agreed to invest RMB200 million in a corn-processing production line to manufacture this environmental-friendly bio-chemical product, which is projected to have considerable demand on the market.

Scheduled to start construction in 2010, the project is expected to begin with an annual production capacity of 10,000 tonnes and gradually increases to one million tonne per year.

Li added that COFCO is now in talks with Purac, a Holland-based acid producer who owns the technology of the corn-based polylactic acid production, to purchase the relevant patents.

According to Li, COFCO has been partnering with Sinopec on the development of fuel ethanol and other bio-chemical projects since 2006.

Sinopec Group is the parent company of China Petroleum & Chemical Corporation.