By Christopher Alessi in Frankfurt and Jacob Bunge in Chicago 

Bayer AG will maintain Monsanto Co.'s entire U.S. workforce after the German chemicals giant's planned $57 billion acquisition of the U.S. agrochemical group, a spokesman for President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday.

According to Trump transition team spokesman Sean Spicer, Bayer Chief Executive Werner Baumann pledged in a recent meeting with Mr. Trump to keep 100% of Monsanto's more than 9,000 U.S. jobs in the country and to create at least 3,000 new U.S. high-tech jobs. Mr. Baumann also committed to spending $8 billion on new research and development plans, Mr. Spicer said on a call with reporters.

"The reason for this commitment and expansion is because of the president-elect's focus on creating a better business climate here in the United States," Mr. Spicer added, noting that Monsanto's headquarters would remain in St. Louis.

In a joint statement that followed the Trump team's remarks, Bayer and Monsanto said the merger would create "several thousand" new high-tech positions in the U.S., but they declined to comment on concrete job numbers.

Bayer's pledge makes it the latest major company to make commitments on U.S. jobs, investment or operations following Mr. Trump's November election after a campaign that emphasized job creation and domestic business expansion. Mr. Trump vowed to bring back manufacturing positions to the U.S., and since his election has castigated companies for shifting operations abroad while praising others for domestic expansion plans.

General Motors Co. on Tuesday confirmed a plan to invest a further $1 billion in its U.S. manufacturing operations, while Hyundai Motor Co. outlined a new $3.1 billion investment in U.S. manufacturing plants. Also on Tuesday, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. touted its plans to add about 10,000 U.S. jobs this year. Last week, Amazon.com Inc. outlined plans for an additional 100,000 full-time U.S. jobs.

Bayer's Mr. Baumann and Monsanto Chief Executive Hugh Grant met with the president-elect last week in New York to make the case for Bayer's planned takeover of the U.S. seed maker amid concerns over whether such a deal could hurt U.S. jobs and competitiveness. Some farmers and state agricultural officials on Mr. Trump's agricultural advisory committee, created last year to advise Mr. Trump's campaign on farm policy matters, have called on Mr. Trump to block tie-ups between some of the agricultural industry's biggest players, over concerns that competition will slacken and prices for seeds and crop sprays will rise.

--Damian Paletta contributed to this article.

Write to Christopher Alessi at christopher.alessi@wsj.com and Jacob Bunge at jacob.bunge@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 17, 2017 14:00 ET (19:00 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.