The ongoing crisis in Russia has hit India’s guar gum exporters hard. Orders from Russia have declined at least by 30% in the October–December quarter which, traders believe, would be difficult to overcome in near future.

“While depreciating rouble has hit order flow, falling crude oil prices have also hit demand of guar gum. We estimate at least 30% decline in exports in the second quarter of the current financial year as the fall, which started in October would continue through year end and beyond,” said Bheru Jain, partner with Rajasthan Gum Pvt Ltd. one of India’s largest guar gum exporters to Russia. Most of the guar demand is driven by the petroleum industry.

Guar gum tops the list in agri-commodities' exports to Russia with an annual shipment of around $55 million, a third of overall exports to the country facing economic sanctions from the western world.

Exporters of other agri commodities also face similar problems. “We estimate a steep decline in overall grapes exports to Russia. But we will recover the loss through increased exports to other countries being our overall quantity of agri exports very small,” said Ashok Sharma, Chief Executive, Mahindra and Mahindra (Agri Division).

Russia imported fresh grapes worth $38.28 million in 2013-14, constituting the second largest in the list of agri commodities shipment from India.

Source:- business-standard.com