When it launches on April 1, Landus Cooperative will be the seventh-largest grain company in the United States, says DTN. Members of the Farmers Cooperative and the West Central Cooperative voted to merge under the name of Landus. The merger partners were giants already and together would have a business volume of $1.5 billion. Farmers Co-op, based in Ames, Iowa, has a trade area of 3 million acres. West Central, in Ralston, Iowa, operates in 12 of Iowa’s 99 counties. Milan Kucerak, CEO of West Central, will become the top officer of Landus. Leaders of each of the merger partners said the new entity would be large enough and financially strong enough to preserve local ownership for years into the future. Besides landing in the top 10 of grain companies, Landus also could rank among the 20 largest cooperatives, said DTN.