2006 Annual Report
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Dear Shareholders
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A GROWTH INDUSTRY

Our industry is driven by simple facts: there will be more people in the world tomorrow than today, and they will earn more income and eat more diverse diets than in the past. New market forces will emerge, but at its core the agribusiness and food industry will be based on the need to feed a growing population.

At Bunge, we ask a few questions when considering the future of our industry. Where will growth in food consumption occur? Where will farmers produce the crops necessary to meet this demand? How can we connect these areas most efficiently and add value to products at the same time?

PRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION

The answers to the first two questions are clear. People around the world, especially in developing economies, are earning higher incomes and consuming more meat protein, usually in the form of chicken and pork. Greater purchases of these products lead to increased demand for soybean meal, a primary protein additive in animal feed. Simultaneously, as people around the world supplement their diets with foods purchased away from home, they consume more vegetable oil. Demand for both soybean meal and vegetable oil has risen at 5 percent per year since 1992. Growth has been particularly impressive in Asia. The incremental use of agricultural commodities in non-food applications should only strengthen these trends.

The potential to grow and export large amounts of key crops, such as soy, corn and wheat, is limited to a few primary regions: North America, South America and Eastern Europe.

North America is the world's largest agricultural producer, and steady improvements in agronomics and seed technology should enable the region to improve corn production yields. Considering that the United States produced 268 million metric tons of corn in 2006, even modest gains are significant.

South America, blessed with sun, ample water resources and the ability to shift millions of hectares of existing agricultural land from pasture to annual crops, has the most potential for incremental growth and is expected to become the largest supplier of commodity food products to the world. By 2015, the region should produce 156 million metric tons of soybeans. It also has strong potential in corn, sugar and other crops. This is the primary reason why the Brazilian fertilizer market has been one of the fastest-growing in the world and holds promise for long-term expansion.

By improving production yields and infrastructure, Eastern Europe should reassume its role as a regional breadbasket and export millions of tons of wheat and grains to markets in the Mediterranean and Middle East.

LINKING REGIONS

Because major expansion in production will not occur where consumption is strongest, the world will continue to need an efficient and safe means of transporting and processing the millions of tons of commodity food products it consumes each year. To fulfill its goals, the world needs an integrated food and agribusiness production chain that enables a seamless global market.

This is where Bunge comes in.

Bunge connects production and consumption markets efficiently and profitably, and adds value at the same time. We construct and acquire assets-fertilizer plants, grain elevators, oilseed processing plants, refineries and mills-throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia, link them with logistics systems and coordinate them with global risk management and commercial teams. At almost every point on the chain, we transform the commodities we handle into the products that farmers, commercial customers and consumers require.





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