CLFMA CFO Forum emphasises vital role of livestock in rural India

CLFMA CFO Forum emphasises vital role of livestock in rural India
In India, about 20.5 million people depend for their livelihood, upon livestock sector, which contributes about 4 percent to country’s GDP and 26 percent to total agriculture GDP

CLFMA organised its first “CFO Forum” in association with NCDEX IPFT for senior-level professionals from various sub-sectors of livestock industry such as poultry, dairy, feed and aquaculture. The CLFMA CFO Forum witnessed expert speakers’ offering deeper insights on the prospects and potential of the sector from financial perspective.
B. Soundararajan, Chairman of CLFMA of India opened the forum by emphasising the vital role of livestock industry being the lifeline of rural India. He urged the members of the industry especially CFO’s to think strategically with a long-term vision. G Chandrashekhar, noted policy commentator and senior journalist offered a global outlook on various commodities and key drivers that are to be tracked on a regular basis. He predicted an imminent rate hike by US Fed possible due to upward trend continuing in the crude prices.
Ashish Modani from ICRA spoke on the macro-economic factors impacting the industry while explaining about exports particularly, bovine meat. With the livestock industry contributing to 8.5 percent of the employment and 4 percent of the GDP, this sector must focus on the quality of the overall industry infrastructure particularly processing and cold storage.
The importance of risk reduction to ensure a stable cash flow and profitability was highlighted by Rahul Ghosh from NCDEX IPFT. He emphasised on the need to follow a policy-based structure approach to optimise the risk ratio. He also mentioned that price volatility is the biggest risk in our business. M Krishna Rao from State Bank of India focused on bottom line being key for any business; priority sector lending by connecting to the right persons in need; and diversity beyond crop loans where livestock sector; and how digital technology enables efficient loan processing.
Speaking about various nitty-gritties of GST, Raghavan Ramabadran from Lakshmikumaran & Sridharan enlightened the audience about tax compliance and how GST enables seamless flow of credit in both goods and services across borders. Articulating his passion, Ashish Mantri of Abhay Cotex shared his experience of getting funded by VC & PE players and stated that alternative proteins will lead the next wave of revolution in food and feed. He said big picture thinking, global business model, innovation & collaborations will attract investment and enable effective asset utilisation.
Sharing insights on blockchain technology, Sudhir Chaudhary of Auxesis Group said how innovations and evolving technologies help improve efficiency and safety in transactions for example, smarter contracts enabling faster and safer transactions. Dr D Ravindra of National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) stressed the difference between viability and bankability and mentioned that socio-economic and environmental parameters are becoming more and more important in the process of evaluating potential projects for financing.
Summarising the entire event, SV Bhave, Deputy Chairman, CLFMA stressed on efficiency and far-sighted approach for the CFOs and concluded the forum by saying that livestock industry is poised to continue on its upward growth trend.
Commenting on the programme, Raghavan Sampathkumar, Executive Director, CLFMA said, “Livestock sector deserves more attention, budgetary allocation and parity with crop-based agriculture. We appreciate the support from NCDEX IPFT for organising this event successfully.”
CLFMA of India is the apex organisation and the voice of the country’s dynamic livestock sector. It currently has over 230 members representing diverse sub-sectors of animal protein value chain including feed manufacturing; poultry, dairy and aquaculture business; animal nutrition and health, veterinary services, machinery and equipment; processing, distribution and retailing of meat; and ancillary services such as banking.
National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX), one of the leading commodity Exchanges in the country has started series of initiatives to educate and inform stakeholders about the commodity market, different stages of post-harvest activities management and benefits of using various hedging tools like Futures and Options.

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