Introduction

Plant breeders and suppliers of seed of superior varieties for farmers, growers and the food and amenity industries

Limagrain is the UK’s leading plant breeder and seed producer, introducing varieties and seeds with improved performance for crops from wheat and barley to maize, from forage crops to amenity grasses and ley mixtures, and from sugar beet and oilseed crops to vining peas and pulses.

The new varieties that the company introduces every year from its research programmes offer benefits to farmers and growers: increased yield, stronger agronomic characteristics, and better disease resistance.  End users benefit from added value, improved quality, productivity and processability.

Limagrain UK benefits from both a strong pedigree from the past, and from the development of cutting edge technology.  Our history in the UK industry, combines famous names: Nickerson, Sharpes, Advanta, Hurst, Milne Masters and Sinclair McGill.  We have an unrivalled heritage of seedsmanship to draw upon. Our early adoption of technology, from advanced trials design, to doubled haploids and molecular biology, gives us the power to produce ever-better varieties with step changes in performance.  Limagrain invests over £3.5m per year into research in the UK, and over £125m elsewhere in the world.  We are major supporters of public and private research partnerships with universities and institutes.  

We have the resources needed to continue to supply new and innovative varieties.  Our intention is to maintain Limagrain’s position as the leading UK plant breeder and seed producer into the future.  

Group Limagrain - Internationally

Limagrain is a fast growing international agricultural co-operative group, specialising in both agricultural and horticultural seeds, and in cereal products.  As the largest plant breeder and seeds company in Europe and the fourth largest in the world, it employs over 6,000 people (more than 1200 in research) and turns over more than £1.1 billion annually.

As a company owned by farmers, it has particular governance strongly linked to farming.  As in agriculture, long-term vision has been the key to Limagrain’s rapid growth over the recent past.  Limagrain’s drive to innovate to create varieties that meet the expectations of farmers and growers, agri-food industrialist and consumers has led to Limagrain’s strong position in farming worldwide.

Limagrain has its roots in the Auvergne plains in central France, but its seeds activity is worldwide, and will continue to make a significant contribution to meeting the global agricultural challenges of the 21st century.