WORKERS at Syngenta have been left shell-shocked by the announcement that 280 jobs are to go.

Employees leaving the site yesterday said the news had left workers downcast.

One, who asked not to be named, said: "It's not good news, is it? A lot of people have been with the company for 20 or 30 years."

Another described the mood among staff as "subdued", adding: "People are now concerned to find out who will be going."

One employee said he expected to keep his job for now.

But he feared that Syngenta would not have a long-term future with the loss of 40% of the workforce and the closure of key plants.

"I don't know if there will be anything left in five years' time," he said.

Syngenta officials have said Huddersfield remains an important site for the company.

SYNGENTA'S sprawling Deighton works has been a centre of chemical manufacturing for almost 90 years.

The site running alongside Leeds Road was originally used as to stage the Great Yorkshire Show.

Chemicals were first made there in 1916 by the British Dyestuffs Corporation.

At one time, the site employed 6,000 people.

In 1926, the company became part of the newly-formed Imperial Chemical Industries.

The site remained part of ICI for the next 70 years, producing a range of chemical compounds that went into products including textile dyes, paints, plastics, pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals.

In 1993, the works became Zeneca, a subsidiary of the ICI group focusing on making ingredients such as weedkillers, fungicides and insecticides for agrochemicals.

The works changed hands in 1999 with the £23bn merger of Zeneca and Swedish drugs firm Astra. At that stage, the Leeds Road works had 1,400 employees.

The company changed its name to Syngenta in 2000 after Zeneca Agrochemicals was hived off by AstraZeneca and merged with the agrochemical business of Swiss- based Novartis.

Syngenta, based in Basle, Switzerland, is a major manufacturer of crop protection products.

It employs 19,000 people in more than 90 countries and lists its shares on the stock exchanges in London, New York, Stockholm and Zurich.