Reunification à la Klein Wanzleben

When the border opened on November 9, 1989, the barriers between KWS and the Institute for Beet Research (IfR) also fell. The persons in charge on both sides already knew each other from their various cooperative ventures and quickly entered into a lively dialogue: What might any future cooperation be like? The working groups formed to look at that first examined the options for more intensive collaboration in the fields of breeding, seed production/processing, biotechnology and organization/legal affairs.

Trial crossing of material from KWS and the IfR was agreed for 1990, as was cooperation in biotechnology research and development of the Eastern European market.

KWS’ Executive Board was quick to voice its interest in supporting Klein Wanzleben financially and preserving the location if possible. However, just how that would work legally and organizationally was a moot point in those times of upheaval, since the Institute for Beet Research and its movable and immovable assets were the property of the GDR.

Finally, a promising strategy was developed in intensive coordination meetings in the individual working groups and was subsequently implemented. Backed by a pledge from KWS to take it over, the company Rübenzucht GmbH was founded in Bernburg on September 28, 1990. The sole shareholder with a capital contribution of 20,000 German marks was the Academy of Agricultural Sciences (AdL) and – from October 3, 1990, under the Unification Treaty – the federal state of Saxony-Anhalt. Its business was run by Wolfgang Joachim. The company took over 50 employees from the Institute for Beet Research, the land, real estate and other assets at Klein Wanzleben of which the institute held legal ownership, the breeding material and the variety protection rights. As soon as the company was founded, negotiations to sell it began between the AdL and KWS and the notarized purchase agreement was able to be concluded in Magdeburg on January 21, 1991.

That paved the way for the establishment of ZKW Züchtungsgesellschaft Klein Wanzleben, a wholly-owned subsidiary of KWS. The company had returned to its roots after 47 years. When Carl-Ernst Büchting, at the time Chairman of KWS’ Supervisory Board, visited his birthplace for the first time since the fall of the wall on August 16, 1991, he recalled in an emotional speech that the sugar refinery Zuckerfabrik Kleinwanzleben (ZKW) was renowned worldwide up to the end of the Second World War.

The sugarbeet breeding material in Klein Wanzleben was evaluated between 1991 and 1993. A comparison with KWS’ gene pool revealed it was inferior, in particular in terms of seed quality. A separate program for its continued use directly in breeding work was therefore discontinued as of 1994. Some of the gene sources were included in the long-term warehouse.

Following evaluation, a separate task profile was developed for ZKW Züchtungsgesellschaft and fifty permanent employees were hired. The station’s main tasks in the following years were: Sugarbeet performance tests in Klein Wanzleben and Friemar (Thuringia), production of basic sugarbeet seed in the open air and in polyhouses, rearing of stecklings, trial planting and observation in the open air, field emergence tests for sugarbeet seed and testing of annual plants in the greenhouse.

Analysis of beet pulp samples in the laboratory building newly erected in 1991 was a further key task for the station. After the beet lab in Einbeck was closed in 2003, all beet pulp analytics activities were pooled at Klein Wanzleben. Processing and storage of basic seed and original samples was also specified as part of the long-term concept for the station.

Apart from sugarbeet, Klein Wanzleben also handled KWS’ fodder beet program up to 2005. Since 1991, ZKW’s employees have built up and managed a farm with great success. The area to be cultivated grew from around 602 hectares to begin with to 1,600 hectares after 1996 with the lease of the Dreileben estate. The objective was and still is to run a large farm with KWS’ varieties and know-how successfully – as a practical means of acquiring customers.

The investments made by KWS at Klein Wanzleben in the past 30 years were vital. Many of the machines and buildings bought there by KWS in 1991 were dilapidated. Exceptionally high costs were needed to preserve the buildings and make them suitable for research and breeding tasks. KWS invested a total of more than €20 million between 1991 and 2018, of which €10.7 million alone went to redevelopment of land and renovation of buildings.

Another influential decision for the station in Klein Wanzleben was made in 2007: the merger with Anhaltische Pflanzenzucht GmbH in Bernburg. Like ZKW Klein Wanzleben, it was founded in 1990 under the name APZ (Anhaltische Pflanzenzucht GmbH Bernburg). Together with APZ, KWS had bought the corn breeding operations of the Institute for Cereals Research in Bernburg-Hadmersleben. A lot of restructuring work has also been carried out there since 1990:

• Reorientation from breeding cooperation toward support for the entire independent breeding program for Northwestern Europe as a service unit
• Significant improvements in the degree of mechanization and in technology – from sowing to harvesting and processing
• Move from support from a fixed location to mobile support at many locations, in particular for performance tests
• Systematic use of winter generations through KWS’ network
• Transition to line development using doubled haploid (DH) technology
• Sharp progress in yields through breeding
• Considerable increase in the amount of work and budget.

The merger of the two companies APZ and ZKW with the breeding station in Klein Wanzleben in 2007 created the foundation for ensuring that breeding work could be continued competitively. Corn breeding was modernized and expanded thanks to extensive investments and the use of building space. Optimized technology processes and synergy effects in terms of personnel and technology enabled the station to take over the energy sorghum program from 2008 on and the new breeding program “Corn Northern and Eastern Europe” as of 2011. That entailed a further increase in breeding area and headcount. KWS now has 65 employees in Klein Wanzleben. All that has boosted the station’s efficiency and will also help enhance the attractiveness of Klein Wanzleben as a location in the future. |