DSM Increases Price of China-Produced Vitamin C by 10%

26 Sep 2016 --- Royal DSM, a global science-based company active in health, nutrition and materials, has announced that it is increasing prices for the Vitamin C forms produced in China by a minimum of 10%. The price change will affect non-contracted business and is effective immediately.

Discussing the price increase, Nelleke Barning, Global Director Communications and External Affairs, DSM Nutritional Products, told FoodIngredientsFirst,“We continually invest in upgrading and developing our production sites, in particular those we acquired in China with Aland (DSM Jiangshan), improving efficiency and environmental performance.”

Barning continued, “As everyone knows, there have been clear upward pressures on production costs in China, such as increasing wages and more stringent environmental regulations, (which, by the way, we welcome) against a backdrop of historically declining prices. We need to ensure the balance is right for our business.”

The company stated that the price increase will also ensure their clients continue to benefit from a healthy vitamin C market.

“Vitamin C is a key nutritional ingredient with various benefits for human health; it’s important that the market is also healthy,” explained Barning.

“This requires investment in line with DSM’s Quality for Life principles. Clients will benefit from a healthy market as well.”

The company, which claims to ‘drive economic prosperity, environmental progress and social advances to create sustainable value for all stakeholders simultaneously’ is in the process of implementing a strategy to grow and support its global business.

As part of this strategy, it has recently opened an expanded Research & Technology Center in Troy, Michigan, U.S, with hopes of strengthening the DSM Engineering Plastics’ product development and application development capabilities in North America.

Commenting on the launch, Rein Borggreve, Vice President, Research & Technology for DSM Engineering Plastics said “The launch of this new research center is in line with DSM’s strategy to support and grow its business, not only with customers in the U.S., but globally.

“Many of our accounts run global businesses, so we can serve our customers worldwide, with a local footprint.”

Currently, DSM delivers annual net sales of about €10 billion.

by Hannah Gardiner