The estimated Rs 1.5 lakh crore branded pulses market in the country has attracted yet another corporate, thanks to the hefty margins and potential for growth it commands. Mahindra Agri Solutions (MASL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of M&M, which launched tur dal under NuPro brand a year ago in Mumbai, has launched chana, moong, masoor and urad dals across 4000 outlets in the city.

NuPro pulses are targeted at the upper middles class, educated woman of the city. Urad dal has been priced at Rs 130 per half a kilo, moong dal (Rs 185 a kilo), Masoor Dal (Rs 160/kg) and chana dal (Rs 175 a kilo). The premiums that the unpolished dals command range from 50-100 per cent to the normal variety of dals, basis consumer affairs ministry data on July 5.

Justifying the prices, Sharma said, "These are sundried, unpolished variety of pulses which take approximately half the time to cook. Besides we vouchsafe for the purity and high quality assurance, which is why NuPro had a healthy 30 per cent repeat purchase."

The two larger rivals of MASL are Tata Sampann and Satyam, which have 20 per cent and 8-9 per cent market share in Mumbai respectively, said Sharma.

The company which had sales of Rs 2.5 crore in pulses in FY16 targets to generate revenue of Rs 20 crore from pulses in the current fiscal in Mumbai. It's grander aims include expanding to the country's top 10 cities over the years and commanding a 5 per cent market share of the overall Rs 1.5 lakh cr branded market.

MASL also sells edible oils like soya and mustard under the NuPro brand in West Bengal, and fruits and vegetables under the Saboro, Spanish for tasty, brand. The revenues of MASL grew 12 times to Rs 900 crore in the past five years through fiscal year 2015-16.

Around 90-95 per cent of the procurement of pulses is from the domestic market, mainly APMC market yards and appx 10 per cent from Myanmar, Tanzania and Canada. The company has reached out to 2500 farmers in Maharashtra in areas like Latur and Amravati and plans to swathe 10,000 farmers in the near future.

In fact, claims Sharma, the productivity of pulses, which stands at an average 650 kg/hectare in India, rose to 800-850 kilo/ha, thanks to advisory and high quality input sales by MASL to farmers inn Latur. In comparison average yield in China is 1900 kg/ha for pulses, Sharma added.

Ashok Gulati, Infosys chair professor for agri at ICRIER, also said that corporates tend to charge higher premiums because of "quality assurance" and brand equity "which isn't built out of thin air." "If you knew the kind of oils being used by some to polish dals in the unorganized sector, you'd stop eating them," he said. "The bigwigs (corporates) can't afford to erode their brand equity by engaging in malpractice so you as a customer can be sure of quality even if you're paying a higher price."

The size of the branded pulses market is a tad less than 1 per cent of the overall size of the pulses market countrywide at Rs 156 lakh crore, which opens the potential for tremendous growth of the organized sector, Sharma add

Sources :economictimes.indiatimes.com