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Agrotech, Finance

Bayer grew sales by double-digit percentages at herbicides, fungicides, and soybean seed & traits on a currency- and portfolio-adjusted basis

In the agricultural business (Crop Science), Bayer increased sales by 11.1 per cent (Fx & portfolio adj.) to 20.207 billion euros. The division grew sales significantly across all regions, especially in Latin America and Asia/Pacific. At Corn Seed & Traits, sales were up 9.2 per cent thanks to increased market share in North America and Latin America, as well as to higher prices worldwide. Bayer grew sales by double-digit percentages at Herbicides (15.4 per cent), Fungicides (13.8 per cent) and Soybean Seed & Traits (14.9 per cent) on a currency- and portfolio-adjusted basis. The main drivers were price increases for glyphosate-based products at Herbicides, and higher Fox Xpro volumes in Latin America at Fungicides. Soybean Seed & Traits benefited from higher volumes and prices, particularly in North America and Latin America.

EBITDA before special items at Crop Science increased by 3.6 per cent to 4.698 billion euros, resulting in a margin of 23.2 per cent. The growth in earnings was mainly driven by higher prices and volumes as well as contributions from ongoing efficiency programs. By contrast, earnings were diminished by a largely inflation-fueled increase in the cost of goods sold, as well as by negative currency effects of 387 million euros.

Bayer sees encouraging steps regarding glyphosate litigation in the US.

Bayer grew sales by double-digit percentages at

Agrotech

Key utilities featured are mandi prices, automated soil labs, crop health

WayCool Foods has launched its next-gen Ai powered ‘Outgrow App’. The App will provide comprehensive advisory and personalised solutions in Tamil, Kannada, Telugu, Hindi, Marathi, and English languages. With the Outgrow App, WayCool aims to assist small, medium, and marginalised farmers to increase their income and profitability. The app during its launch phase will support farmers based in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana offering a boutique of services, mandi prices, automated soil testing facilities, Crop Health.

Sendhil Kumar, Head Farmer Engagement & Outgrow, WayCool Foods said, “Outgrow App is a go-to-platform for real-time Mandi prices, crop health, automated soil testing, and holistic farm advisory on fingertips. We are also planning to add financial assistance services, farm inputs, procurement services to the app in subsequent phases. Farmers can download the Outgrow APP for free from the google play store”. 

Karthik Jayaraman, MD, WayCool Foods said, “This is a major step towards our mission to build the world’s most comprehensive tech stack in the food economy. Outgrow App will lessen the digital divide that exists today.”

Key utilities featured are mandi prices, automated

Agro Universities, Bee keeping

Discussions were held on how to create awareness among beekeepers by designing courses with the support of ICAR schemes

A 21- day Winter School on “Commercial Apiculture for Livelihood Security of Farmers and Unemployed Rural Youth” concluded at Punjab Agricultural University (PAU). The programme was organised by the Department of Entomology, PAU under the aegis of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR). In total, 29 participants from 12 states comprising Andhra Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Kashmir, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, New Delhi, Odisha, Punjab, Tamil Nadu and one Union Territory Ladakh participated in the winter school.

In his concluding remarks, the chief guest, Dr Naveen Patle, Additional Commissioner (Horticulture) and Executive Director, National Bee Board, New Delhi, observed that there were some issues and problems in the apiculture sector which called for the attention of the apiculture scientists. 

“Some crops remain untouched and scientists need to work on the schedule of the crops which can be recommended in apiculture,” he said. Besides, Dr Patle made a call for focusing on technology demonstrations, increasing the quality and quality of by-products made from honey, and creating awareness among the beekeepers by designing courses with the support of ICAR schemes.

The guest of honour Dr Seema Jaggi, Additional Director General (Human Resource Development), ICAR, New Delhi, said that apiculture was an area where more entrepreneurs could be developed. The winter school was a two-way process; it provided an opportunity to disseminate knowledge in apiculture (by experts) and learn in return (from participants). Seeing the relevance of beekeeping, the programme was chalked out for the livelihood and security of the farmers, she remarked.

Dr Sandeep Bains, Nodal Officer and Dean, Postgraduate Studies, said that the university made an outstanding contribution in the commercialisation and industrialisation of apiculture, thus, opening the gates for the export of Apis Mellifera in 1996. “PAU has the credit of producing the largest hive manufacturers as well as the honey traders and exporters,” she added.

Dr MIS Gill, Dean, College of Agriculture, said: “PAU is leading in apiculture research. Since the introduction of Italian honey bee Apis Mellifera by a noted entomologist Dr AS Atwal in 1962, PAU has never looked back in apiculture.” Apiculture was an asset that could earn money for the small and marginal farmers/labourers, he observed. Dr Gill voiced his concern over the issue of ‘adulteration’ in honey and stressed maintaining its quality to win the faith of the consumers.

Dr DK Sharma, Head, Department of Entomology, said that the department has made 30 national recommendations in apiculture till date. “PAU was the first in India to start Experiential Learning Programme (ELP) in apiculture,” he revealed. The University has the distinction of having an Integrated Beekeeping Development Centre and a Toxicology Laboratory, fully equipped with state-of-the-art equipment for the analysis of pesticide residues in agricultural produce and commodity samples. The lab is set up as per the Bureau of Indian Standards under the National Accreditation Board for Laboratory and has been declared as the referral lab for pesticide residue analysis at the national level, he told.

Dr PK Chhuneja, Professor of Entomology and Course Director, in his welcome address, said that the winter school was a great learning experience for the apiculture scientists. It touched all the developmental aspects of apiculture through the organisation of 100 specialised lectures and virtual tours of apicultural manufacturers and beekeeping entrepreneurs, he added. Dr Chhuneja disclosed that the participants also toured Nagrota Bagwan (then in Punjab state and presently in Himachal Pradesh), where Apis Mellifera was introduced in India in 1962.

 Dr Jaspal Singh, Principal Entomologist, proposed a vote of thanks.

During the programme, four participating scientists, namely, Dr Sunita Yadav, Haryana Agricultural University, Hisar; Dr Kumaranag KM, ICAR- All India Coordinated Research Project (Honey Bees and Pollinators); Dr Ipsita Odisi Priyadarsini Mishra, Odisha University of Agriculture and Technology, Odisha; and Dr PS Neharkar, Vasantrao Naik Marathwada Krishi Vidyapeeth, Prabhani, Maharashtra, hailed the informative lectures and the tours, organised by the PAU. They described the winter school training as ‘excellent.’

Discussions were held on how to create

Agro Universities, Agrotech

The transfer of technology is aimed at enhancing the banana production system in Tamil Nadu

The ICAR-National Research Centre for Banana, Tiruchirapalli, Tamil Nadu licensed and transferred its Technology – ‘A Micronutrient Mixture – Banana Shakti’ to the three different stakeholders, viz., KVK, Namakkal, Tamil Nadu State Rural Livelihood Mission (TNSRLM), Kanyakumari, Tamil Nadu, and KVK, Karur respectively.

Dr S Uma, Director, ICAR-NRC for Banana, Tiruchirapalli stressed addressing the micronutrient deficiency in the banana production system immediately with a more scientific approach. The technology has been widely used by the farmers across Tamil Nadu and is gaining momentum in the other states as well. Dr Uma stated that the technology is low-cost, more adaptable, trial-able and farmer-friendly.

Dr KJ Jeyabaskaran, Principal Scientist, ICAR-NRC for Banana & Inventor of the Technology underlined that the micronutrient mixture – Banana Shakti primarily corrects the micronutrient deficiency and at the same time, increases the “use efficiency” of the primary and secondary macronutrients in the Banana production system. It increases the productivity by 15 per cent to 20 per cent and enhances the quality too.

Dr Jeyabaskaran stated that with the investment of Rs 5,000 for its application, an additional net profit of Rs one Lakh per hectare could be accrued. He emphasized that it also improves the shelf life and reduces the skin splitting of banana fruits.

The transfer of technology is aimed at enhancing the banana production system in Tamil Nadu.

The transfer of technology is aimed at

Agro Universities, Environment, Sustainability

The weather station will aid farmers in managing pests and various diseases

The new Automatic Weather Station (AWS) at Department of Plant Pathology, ICAR-Indian Institute of Rice Research, Hyderabad established under the DST-ICRISAT collaborative Project on Centre of Excellence on Climate Change Research for Plant Protection: Pest and Disease Management has opened.

Dr RM Sundaram, Director, ICAR-IIRR, Hyderabad and Dr Mamta Sharma, Project Coordinator, Deputy Regional Director-Asia, ICRISAT, Hyderabad inaugurated the Station.

Dr MS Prasad, Head, Plant Pathology, ICAR-IIRR, Hyderabad underlined the project. Dr V Prakasam, Principal Investigator underlined the 12 Soil and Atmospheric Weather Parameters recorded in the AWS.

The weather station will aid farmers in

Environment

Summit Carbon Solutions will primarily capture CO2 from ethanol plants and other industrial sources in Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota

Summit Carbon Solutions has recently announced a strategic investment from Continental Resources, to create the largest carbon capture and sequestration project of its kind in the world.

Continental Resources will commit $250 million over the next two years to help fund the development and construction of the project’s associated capture, transportation, and sequestration infrastructure, while also leveraging its operational and geologic expertise to help ensure the safe and secure storage of CO2.

Summit Carbon Solutions will primarily capture CO2 from ethanol plants and other industrial sources in Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota. The CO2 will be aggregated and transported to North Dakota via pipeline, where it will be safely and permanently sequestered in extensively researched subsurface geologic formations.

The project has commitments from 31 partner ethanol facilities to deliver more than 8.0 million metric tons per annum (MMtpa) of CO2, with initial pipeline capacity of 12.0 MMtpa, and expansion capabilities to handle up to 20.0 MMtpa.

Recognising the significant growth in demand for low carbon fuels, Summit began developing plans for the project and its partnerships with ethanol producers in 2019. By leveraging decades of experience and relationships across the biofuels and agriculture industries, Summit Carbon Solutions was launched in early 2021, and is on track to achieve its target of being operational in the first half of 2024.

“Summit and Continental have a shared vision to produce clean and cost-effective energy for all Americans. This project will be transformational for the ethanol and agriculture industries and will have a substantial economic impact across the Midwest,” said Bruce Rastetter, CEO of Summit Agricultural Group.

Summit Carbon Solutions will primarily capture CO2

Agrotech

FamERP is known to help manage farms and farmlands seamlessly and efficiently

FarmERP is a future-ready Enterprise-Resource Management software platform designed by the co-founders of Shivrai Technologies. It is known to help manage farms and farmlands seamlessly and efficiently.

Data Capturing and Data Management both are advantageous practices that every industry requires. FarmERP facilitates the provision of every service that is required by an agri-business in the full circle from start to end. From accounting for the most minute expenses to executing the largest orders, all the data are recorded and organised in a very systematic form for the ultimate calculations to be accurate.

Having a well-organised record of all activity facilitates the farmers to produce a better-quality yield. A well-managed and an organised structure can influence the right decisions to be taken at every step of the way, making certain that every arrow pulled has a relatively greater chance of capturing the bull’s eye. This is where FarmERP comes into frame to try and aid the smoother functioning of farms by helping farmers resolve their farming problems effectively, efficiently, and seamlessly.

Additionally, many farmers face hurdles in the financial aspect of business and as the yield quality keeps fluctuating; it also affects the money it makes. With the inculcation of an Enterprise-Resource Planning software like FarmERP, the chance of fluctuation in the quality is minimized as per practical possibilities, hence, stabilising the income of farmers.

Loans and transactions are also problems that FarmERP helps farmers to resolve. This aspect of the software makes sure to eliminate the possibility of exploitation of the farming families.

FarmERP’s enhanced software holds in place the existence of an intelligent layer that not only records business information, but also processes it.

Enterprise-Resource Planning does not only pertain to large-scale businesses, in fact, it is required by all businesses at all scales. The software offers options that are most suitable to particular needs and deliver expected efficiency.

Hence, FarmERP can be the strongest weapon that the Agriculture Industry can deploy to evolve at the highest level of optimisation.

FamERP is known to help manage farms

People, Sustainability

Kelly Gast has been appointed as the assuming the position of Chief Financial Officer

Bayer announced changes in the leadership team of its Crop Science division, with Kelly Gast assuming the position of Chief Financial Officer (CFO) from Michael. Schulz, effective April 1, 2022. Schulz had been CFO for the Crop Science division for over a decade and decided to leave Bayer for personal reasons after 16 years with the company. Gast is currently CFO for Bayer’s US organization.

“Kelly has tremendous experience in finance and a true passion for the agricultural sector. She will play a key role in driving our performance and business transformation,” said Rodrigo Santos, Member of the Board of Bayer AG and President of the company’s Crop Science division.

Separately, Sara Boettiger, SVP, Head of Global Sustainability & Public Affairs, shared her wish to leave the organisation. During her time with Bayer, she has made significant contributions to the Crop Science division by driving sustainability and public affairs agendas.

Bayer will take this opportunity to further embed sustainability and public engagement at the heart of its Crop Science divisional roadmap by combining the sustainability and public affairs teams with the strategy team, under the leadership of Frank Terhorst, EVP, Strategy & Sustainability, effective March 1, 2022.

Kelly Gast has been appointed as the

Acquaculture, AgroPolicy, Sustainability

Goes in for fishery and earns profit

North Eastern Region Community Resource Management Society (NERCRMS) under the North Eastern Region Community Resource Management Project (NERCORMP) is helping women groups in Bordumsa, a small hamlet in Changalang district, Arunachal Pradesh, where most people depend on agriculture and farm labour. The villagers received financial support of Rs 46,186 and had collected a total of Rs 79099 from all sources. The group members chose fishery as a group activity for self-sustainability.

The group had 11 members, and the majority of them worked in agriculture. The group used to meet regularly to discuss various topics such as loans, savings, group activities, etc., with a total savings of Rs 10,710.

Initially, they invested Rs 8800 for the purchase of fish saplings and other development costs. As a group activity, the total profit from fishing was Rs 20,000. Every two years, the fish ponds are harvested. As a result of this activity, many changes in the organisation occurred, including unity, leadership, self-sustainability, and other developing social services such as cleaning drives, etc.

The project improved the economic status of the locals, making a difference in their lives. Furthermore, SHGs express their gratitude to NERCORMP for enabling them to overcome other domestic issues in their family through NERCORMP’s support and execution.

Goes in for fishery and earns profitNorth

Agro Universities

Under the grant, PAU will be conducting training sessions and awareness programmes

The Department of Fruit Science, Punjab Agricultural University (PAU), has been granted the prestigious Department of Science and Technology (DST) funded project ‘DST STUTI’ ‘Synergistic Training Programme Utilizing the Scientific and Technological Infrastructure’ programme, by the Government of India, New Delhi. 

Dr Sandeep Singh, Senior Entomologist (Fruits), is the Program Coordinator of this project in collaboration with Dr GR Chaudhary, Professor of Chemistry, Panjab University, Chandigarh with hub and spoke arrangement. The special programme aims at human resources and its capacity building through open access to science and technology Infrastructure. 

According to Dr Sandeep Singh, the objectives will be achieved by organising short-term courses/workshops on the awareness, use and application of various instruments and analytical techniques. Under the grant of this programme, PAU will be conducting training sessions and awareness programmes under the ‘Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.’

The main focus will be to popularise science and research among the budding science students by organising various activities like quizzes, declamation, poster making competition and visits to analytical instrumentation facility, he said. The lab tour will create awareness among the school students about the role and application of analytical instruments in scientific research, he added.

The PAU Vice-Chancellor DK Tiwari; Dean Postgraduate Studies Dr Sandeep Bains; Director of Research Dr AS Dhatt; Dean, College of Horticulture and Forestry Dr MIS Gill; Additional Director Communication Dr TS Riar; and Head, Department of Fruit Science Dr HS Dhaliwal congratulated Dr Sandeep Singh for this achievement and wished them success in their future endeavours.

Under the grant, PAU will be conducting

Agro Universities, Interaction

The need for developing the climate-smart and high-quality fodder varieties was highlighted by the Chief Guest, Dr DK Yadava, ICAR

The ICAR-Indian Grassland and Fodder Research Institute, Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh has recently virtually organised the “Forage Scientists & Seed Producers’ Interface Meeting of Kharif Fodder Crops”.

The Chief Guest, Dr DK Yadava, ADG (Seeds), ICAR emphasised that the sensitisation and showcasing of the varieties will help in increasing the breeder seed indent of the new varieties. The need for developing the climate-smart and high-quality fodder varieties was highlighted by Dr Yadava.

Dr Amaresh Chandra, Director, ICAR-IGFRI, Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh stressed on apprising the stakeholders about the new varieties and their potential/specialities to suit the various niches.

About 75 participants from ICAR-IGFRI, Jhansi; State Agricultural Universities, NGOs, Private Companies, Regional Fodder Stations, DADF and NDDB, etc., attended the meeting.

The need for developing the climate-smart and high-quality

Company News

New Synergize RTU disinfectant removes the need to mix, saving producers time and eliminating the need to handle the concentrated product

NEOGEN Corporation has recently announced that it has added a ready-to-use formulation of their Synergize disinfectant to their biosecurity portfolio.

Synergize RTU is a new formulation of the company’s Synergize disinfectant that has been trusted by producers for over 20 years. The disinfectant and deodoriser require no mixing, eliminating several steps that were required to use the concentrated product, saving users both time and money spent on the personal protective equipment items required to handle the concentrate.

“At NEOGEN, we always want to offer solutions that make the process of enhancing animal safety as easy and cost-effective as possible,” said John Adent, NEOGEN’s President and CEO.

Synergize RTU is a non-corrosive, combination ammonium and glutaraldehyde multi-purpose disinfectant that kills both Gram-negative and Gram-positive bacteria, fungi, and viruses, including the viruses that cause avian influenza and COVID-19. It can be applied with a cloth, sponge, mop, or mechanical coarse spray device.

NEOGEN’s comprehensive suite of bio-security products, including sanitisers, apparel, cleaners, and disinfectants, were primarily developed for use in NEOGEN’s agricultural markets, but many are useful in preventing the spread of disease .

New Synergize RTU disinfectant removes the need

Interaction

Tamil Nadu-based Samunnati has recently launched the Annadata Suraksha Abhiyaan, a dedicated crowd-sourcing campaign driven via Samunnati’s corporate social responsibility outreach. Pravesh Sharma, Director, Samunnati Agro shares insights on the aspects related to ‘Annadata Suraksha Abhiyaan’- major activities, challenges and latest launches

What are the major activities completed around ‘Annadata Suraksha Abhiyaan’ in the past 3 months?

To free farmers from the vulnerabilities of personal risks in agriculture, and to promote the culture of insurance across rural India, especially smallholder farmers, Samunnati launched the Annadata Suraksha Abhiyaan on October 2, 2021. We partnered with Milaap, our crowdfunding partner, for this initiative and have raised close to Rs 1 lakh via their platform. We also reached out to various CSR partners and corporate through our larger network to promote awareness about this platform, as well as to invite their contributions towards this noble cause. We are in discussions with a few other leading agri-tech companies to understand how we can work with them to create a bigger socio-economic impact. On the ground, Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) are our last mile partners to reach individual member farmers and deliver product information, enable documentation and assist in claim settlement.

We have raised over Rs 11.5 lakhs in support of this initiative from various sources, including a payroll campaign conducted internally within Samunnati. Through social media handles dedicated to the initiative, we are sustaining our efforts to bring in more participation from Indian corporates and philanthropists.

What are the challenges that Samunnati faced/is facing while rolling out the programme to beneficiaries?

Data collection has been one of the biggest challenges that the Indian agriculture sector has struggled with over the years. Gathering demographic details of individuals including date of birth, contact number, address with pin code, gender, etc. plays a huge role in being able to provide insurance. Unfortunately, this level of detail is not regularly maintained by most of the FPOs in our nation. Further, owing to constraints with staff and other resources, undertaking data collection has also not been an easy task for FPOs.

On-ground activation and awareness building play an important role in the success of such campaigns. As we work around the ongoing pandemic and various restrictions that have been put in place, we are streamlining our efforts to promote the campaign via offline channels in the coming months.

Number of farmers/ FPOs onboarded to the insurance programme and the markets where ASA created the most impact.

To date, we have onboarded around 12,000 farmers from 40 FPOs across 11 States. A majority of these farmers are from Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, and Maharashtra owing to our extensive network in these regions. In Gujarat, we have a long-standing association with GujPro which helped us make in-roads in reaching farmers in the region.

How does your company plan to deliver this scheme to India’s smallholder farmers?

Samunnati plans to partner with farmer collectives (FPCs, Cooperatives etc.) and agri enterprises which closely work with small holder farmers to take this scheme to the last mile. We believe this approach is more sustainable, and scalable. So far, we have on-boarded 40+ FPOs, and 1 Agri enterprise and insured 12,000 farmers.

How can Samunnati bring in a revolution in the agri community through ASA?

India is plagued with the following two challenges:

High incidence of farmer accidents and related fatalities – 2000 plus farming accidents and over 100+ fatalities happen every day, leading to estimated daily losses worth Rs 15Cr

Negligible insurance penetration, less than 1 per cent farmers having access to accident-related insurance

Agriculture in itself is plagued with variety of risks and challenges, while a few government/ private sector initiatives are working towards addressing some of them, initiatives around insurance, and farmer protection from financial distress related to accidents are insignificant. 

The initiative Annadata Suraksha Abhiyaan attempts to fill that void by promoting the insurance culture among farmers and providing personal accident coverage through this initiative. We plan to expand the scale and scope of coverage and include risks related to other farming uncertainties in the years to come.

The initiative aims to make agriculture risk free for our farmers, and for India.

What are your plans for the next five years?
We plan to onboard as many as 5 million farmer families on this platform in the next 5 years. We will be approaching this in phases, mapping the progress we achieve each year.

Pooja Yadav

pooja.yadav@mmactiv.com

Tamil Nadu-based Samunnati has recently launched the Annadata

Dairy

Capacity is likely to increase from the existing 22,000 litres per day to 70,000 litres per day

Hyderabad-based Creamline Dairy Products eyes capacity expansion of Kesavaram plant with an investment of Rs 20 crore. The company, which markets milk and milk products under the Godrej Jersey brand is running out of tetrapak capacity at the plant and with the new plant in process, the capacity will increase from the existing 22,000 litres per day to 70,000 litres per day.

Besides Kesavaram, it has a plant in Telangana at Uppal, Hyderabad. The company, which also has 119 chilling centres, is focused on the southern states and parts of Maharashtra.

Capacity is likely to increase from the