By Ian Gilson, CFA

On August 8, 2012 S&W Seed (NasdaqCM:SANW) announced that it has started to harvest stevia for commercial sale (to PureCircle). These are the plants grown in the 114 acres in Chowchilla, CA that were harvested for the first time a year ago and showed high yields of glycosides. We expect revenue for the current harvest to be reported in the second fiscal quarter since the harvest has to be shipped to Five Points for drying and shipping before being sold. About 75% of the acres will be harvested (85 acres) and another crop from all the acres will be harvested later in 2012.

The additional 150 acres leased for stevia cultivation has been planted recently with high yield plants with superior characteristics may be harvested in the fall of 2012.

PureCircle has announced that it has received patent protection for new high yield plants grown in Paraguay and Kenya. The notice of allowance was for Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni with high concentrations of glycosides. Although S&W Seed did obtain some plants from PureCircle we think the germ plasm did not include the Bertoni variety.

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