As part of de-risking its business, EID (India) Parry part of Murugappa Group, is planning to bring down it depends on its key business, Sugar, while increasing the focus more on Ethanol and Co-generation. Meanwhile, the company has earmarked Rs 100 crore during the current fiscal to enhance its sugar capacity in two plants Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
A Vellayan, chairman, EID Parry (India) Ltd said, sugar industry is the most controlled industry in the country and major risks faced by sugar business including cane availability, harvesting labour, linkage of sugar price to sugar cane price and capacity utilisation of plants.
The company is look at reducing the depends on su-gar, while focusing more on power and Ethanol. “We will attempt to do it to de-risk the business to 30-40 per cent, of the total turnover in the coming years,” he said.
Company’s Managing Director Ravindra S Singhvi added, at present the sugar business contributes around 65 per cent. He added that the company has put up 84.5 mega watt of co-generation plants and 135 KLD of distilleries so far. Commenting on the company’s expansion plans in sugar, he said, around Rs 100 crore will be invested in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh to enhance capacity to crush sugarcane to the tune of 16,000 tonnes from 12,000 tonnes every day. The investment includes Rs 75 crore in Karnataka and Rs 25 crore in Andhra Pradesh.
The Silk Road Refinery, a joint venture with Cargill, presently running at a capacity of less than 35 per cent due to non-availability of raw material gas. “We are planning to increase this to 80-85 per cent by last quarter of the current fiscal, by working on alternate fuels include coal and furnace oil,” said Singhvi.
