B-schools to dabble now in commodities

At least 15 business schools have begun working on commodities course modules to be added to their course curriculum. Many of them are considering full credit courses, of 100 marks, while others are looking at half credit (50 marks) courses.

At present, only three schools "� Institute of Rural Management, Anand, Indian Institute of Management, Indore, and Symbiosis Institute of Management, Pune "� hold commodities classes.

In addition, several institutes devote a brief mention to the commodities along with financial markets.

The trigger for addition of this subject to the curricula is the shortage of qualified professionals. Gaining business in the commodities market has led to a rise in the demand for professionals.

Shortage of professionals in the sector is seen at trading desk and research at various brokerage houses, members of the exchange and corporates. Further, with the banking sector opening up towards commodities hedging soon, industry experts suggest, job opportunities will be created in another segment.

"While in the dealing rooms, we can use the traders with experience in the financial markets, on research desks, trained professionals are a must," said head of leading Mumbai-based brokerage house. At present, because of the lack of qualified professionals, the industry has to manage with professionals with a NCFM certification in commodities (that is, National Stock Exchange's Certification in Financial Markets).

Also, as larger institutional take up exchange memberships, even within the present regulatory contours, demand for professional will rise.

At present, most settle for professional with a NCFM (commodities), when one in finance with commodities is required," said Narendra Gupta, chief business officer with the National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX), one of the three national commodity exchanges in the country.

Growth prospects in commodities are immense. "The sector will have about 1,00,000 new jobs on offer in the next three years," Jignesh Shah, managing director of The Multi-Commodity Exchange of India (MCX). At present, the sector employs about 65,000 people, directly and indirectly.

B-schools currently working on course modules in commodities include IIMs, XLRI-Jamshedpur and Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, Delhi. Also IRMA will soon sign a memorandum of understanding with MCX for a full-credit course in commodity trading.

"We had initiated a half-credit course in commodities in the year 2000 and have got good response from corporates in getting summer projects as well as absorption. Last year, NCDEX (one of the commodity exchanges) absorbed three of our students and we feel more students will be recruited from the current batch," said IRMA's acting director L K Vaswani.

XLRI-Jamshedpur is also working on introducing a module, as part of finance (elective). "Prof Pithabas Mohanty is working on it and we will soon be out with details," said P Venugopal, the institute's Dean.

The exchanges also are playing a role in training professionals via their tie-ups with various B-schools and universities. MCX is working with the IIM, Indore and NCDEX with Symbiosis, Pune.

Both exchanges are in the process of tying up with various premier business schools. Also their staff is invited for guest lectures at various B-schools and universities to help familiar students with the markets.

"The logical corollary is to conduct full-fledged courses along with the faculty which focuses on theory while we (the exchange) share our practical experiences," Gupta said.

And if the B-schools are looking at the commodities segment as the next big thing after IT and Telecom segments, how can universities be left behind.

For instance, the University of Mumbai is working on introducing course modules with the help of MCX. The exchanges are also imparting training programmes like certification, distance education, etc.

Hyderabad-based The Indian School of Business has commodities trading part of its finance module and spokesperson of the B-school, however, feels there is no need to introduce a full-credit module on the subject at the moment.