Riding The Blue Revolution
India is the second largest producer of fish in the world, but that is a story that is not well told. The world’s largest producer of fish is China, which accounts for almost two-thirds of the world’s “farmed fish” going by Food And Agriculture Organization (FAO) statistics.
India has strived to be a close rival since March 2017, with a declared ‘Blue Revolution’ or the Neel Kranti Mission. The prime focus of the mission is to catapult the output of the fisheries in the country to 15 million tonne by 2020-21 (compare that with China’s fish production of close to 70 million tonne in recent years) from 10.79 million tonne in 2014-15. The Blue Revolution aims at prosperity for the fish farmer through global innovations in infrastructure, production of fish frys and fingerlings and fish feed. Alluri Indra Kumar is riding the crest of that revolution with his fish feed and aquaculture venture, Avanti Feeds.
Avanti Feeds began commercial operations two decades ago, led by Kumar’s father, the late Alluri Venkateswara Rao. It had a technical collaboration with Pingtai Enterprises, Taiwan. Indra Kumar was inducted as a director on the Avanti Feeds board in 1992 and took charge as managing director in 2002. He has since broadened the company’s horizons and taken it to new dimensions and new markets.
Alluri Indra Kumar brought on board Thai Union Frozen Products PCL and Avanti Feeds diversified into shrimp culture and processing with the latest technology in feed production. It was able to thus deliver quality at competitive prices to consumers across the world and has never looked back since. The annual growth in the company’s net profit has been to the tune of 155.56 per cent till December 2017.
Avanti Feeds strongly focusses on overseas markets like the United States, Europe and even parts of Africa. It is now betting big on Asian markets too, like Thailand and Vietnam for instance. The tide really turned for Avanti Feeds with Alluri Indra Kumar in straddle as chairman and managing director. The joint venture with Thai Union Frozen Products led to a flourishing shrimp business both within and beyond India. Today Avanti Feeds’ market share in the fish and prawn feed market is 40 per cent. Kumar estimates a 25 per cent growth in business in the 2017- 2018 financial year. In the year ahead he plans value-added products currently unavailable in India.
Avanti Feeds has a shrimp processing capacity of 25 tonnes per day and is commissioning a new plant with a capacity of 75 tonnes per day. Sea food exports have grown steadily during the 2017-18 fiscal, driven by a renewed demand from new markets and proliferation of aquaculture and deep water fishing ventures in India. Experts predict a faster pace of growth for this sector in the light of the government’s focus on food processing.
Avanti Feeds has reaped rich dividends in this environment, bringing in more than 1,000 per cent returns for its shareholders in the last two years. The government’s aim to grow marine exports by 20 per cent annually can only give a further boost toAvanti Feeds profits, since 85 per cent of the company’s revenue comes from shrimp feed and the rest from shrimp processing.
