The top executives of Bayer AG and Monsanto Co. traveled to New York Wednesday to meet with President-elect Donald Trump and make their case for the companies’ planned $66 billion merger.
Fox Business reported that Bayer Chief Executive Werner Baumann and Monsanto CEO and Chairman Hugh Grant met with the president-elect to urge him to throw his support behind their firms’ record merger agreement that would create a new leading international seeds and pesticides powerhouse.
During the meeting with Trump at his transition headquarters in midtown Manhattan, Baumann and Grant reportedly outlined how the deal would create U.S. jobs if approved, according to Fox Business.
A Monsanto spokesperson told Fox Business that the meeting was “productive” and allowed Baumann and Grant to “share their views on the future of the agriculture industry and its need for innovation.”
Monsanto’s deal with Bayer is one of several transactions poised to reshape the global agribusiness industry. Other ongoing deals include a merger between Dow Chemical and DuPont and the takeover of Syngenta by the China National Chemical Corporation.
Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan Inc. and Agrium Inc. – Canada’s largest fertilizer producers – also agreed to merge in September.
Critics – including lawmakers in Congress – have raised concerns that the wave of deals would kill competition and hurt farmers already dealing with a down ag economy.
Several members of the Trump agricultural advisory committee have also previously spoken out against the merger deals, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Monsanto and Bayer expect their merger to be finalized by the end of 2017.