THE first-ever commercially produced Jatropha curcas plants through Singapore-developed
tissue culture will be ready for markets in India and other regions like East Africa and Southeast
Asia by the middle of next year.

Announcing the breakthrough, Singapore-based JOil, a Temasek-Tata venture, said it has
contracted India's largest plant biotech company KF Bioplants (KFB) to produce and deliver
an initial one million Jatropha plants which are used as a renewable biofuels feedstock. JOil,
which announced the deal on Monday, declined to give the contract value. KFB will take
about eight months to grow the elite Jatropha curcas plants from tissue cultures obtained from
mother plants developed by JOil, and the first deliveries to market will be in June 2011.

JOil's initial contract with KFB - covering delivery of one million plants for 18 months - has
an option for extension covering production of five million plants for 3-5 years, a
spokeswoman told BT.