Bengaluru, Feb. 21 -- UPL Ltd plans to spin off and list its crop protection business as an independent entity, as part of a strategy to create the world's second-largest agrochemical firm. The Mumbai-based company announced on Friday a three-step restructuring plan to consolidate its domestic and international pesticide units into a single global entity. This restructuring was initiated in 2022 when the largest agro-chemicals firm in India brought private equity giants into three of its businesses. Under the three-step process, UPL Ltd will first merge its India crop protection subsidiary, UPL Sustainable Agri Solutions, with its parent. This will be followed by the domestic crop protection business being demerged and transferred into a new entity, UPL Global Sustainable Agri Solutions Ltd. Finally, UPL will merge its foreign crop protection business, housed under UPL Corp., into this new entity, UPL Global Sustainable Agri Solutions. The businesses under UPL Global Sustainable Agri Solutions reported revenue of Rs.9,721 crore in October-December, accounting for about 80% of parent UPL Ltd's total revenue of Rs.12,269 crore. UPL Ltd, in a statement to the exchanges, claimed that UPL Global would be the world's second-largest listed pure-play crop protection firm. Syngenta Crop Protection, the Swiss giant, with $13 billion in revenue, is the largest. To put it simply: UPL's new independent entity will be much bigger than the parent. "By unifying our India and international crop protection businesses under UPL Global, we are creating a future-ready platform with the focus, agility and innovation needed to lead in a rapidly evolving market," said Jai Shroff, chairman and Group CEO of UPL Ltd. "This move sharpens strategic focus, aligns stakeholder interests and positions both UPL Ltd and UPL Global for disciplined, value-accretive growth in the years ahead." As part of this demerger, every UPL Ltd shareholder gets 1 share of UPL Global. UPL Ltd's promoters, the Shroff Family, will own 71.56% in UPL Global and have agreed to an 18-month lock-in on their shares post-listing. In 2022, UPL Ltd carved out four businesses as subsidiaries: domestic crop protection, international crop protection, global seeds, and manufacturing and speciality chemicals....