Household products maker Kao Corp. said Tuesday it and major U.S. agribusiness firm Archer Daniels Midland Co. have agreed to form a joint venture to make and sell a Kao cooking oil ingredient that helps reduce the amount of fat amassed in the body.
The two companies plan to set up the fifty-fifty joint venture by the middle of this year and build a pilot plant for diacylglycerol on the premises of ADM, based in Decatur, Illinois. The plant is slated to go online in November, Kao said.
Other details of the joint venture are subject to negotiations, it said.
Diacylglycerol is the main ingredient in Kao's Healthy Econa Cooking Oil. It is derived from soybean fat and rapeseed and retards the development of blood triglyceride, it added.
Diacylglycerol may also be used in frozen foods, snacks and other processed foods, and high demand can be expected in the future, Kao said.
ADM is the largest U.S. crop processor, with annual sales of about $18.6 billion.