Africa rolls out red carpet for Indian poultry industry

Hyderabad: African countries present significant business opportunities for the Indian poultry industry for setting up hatcheries through joint ventures or supplying feed and technology for value-addition.

In this context, the Andhra Pradesh chapter of the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) will be taking a trade delegation to some African countries in September.

As a run-up to this, the CII organised an interactive session on ‘Doing Business with African Countries’, here.

Ms Jerusalem Amdemariam, Minister Counsellor — Economy and Business, Ethiopia; Ms Maria Fatima Phume, Deputy High Commissioner, Mozambique High Commission; and Ms Susan Sikaneta, High Commissioner, High Commission of the Republic of Zambia, extended a “red-carpet invitation” for Indian entrepreneurs to invest in these African countries.

Mr Suresh Chitturi, Chairman, CII —AP Task Force and Agriculture and MD of Srinivasa Hatcheries, who had been on an explorative visit to Africa recently, said the cost of an egg in many parts of Africa was Rs 8 each, almost three times that in India.

“There are enough opportunities for poultry firms and ago-tech companies in Africa. There have been some preliminary visits by the Indian poultry industry to Africa of late,” he said. Srinivasa Hatcheries, a leading poultry firm in the State, is also thinking of doing business in Africa, although plans have not been firmed up yet.

Ms Amdemariam said Ethopia provided a stable business environment for foreign investments. Incentives for foreign investors include full exemption from import customs duties and other taxes levied on imports, 100 per cent repatriation of profits and two to seven years’ exemption of Income Tax on manufacturing and agro-product ventures.

Ms Sikaneta said Zambia had enormous appetite for investments in poultry farming, besides maize, soybean, sugarcane and cotton farming.

“We need lot of storage capacity for milk. Currently, we have a capacity for six lakh tonnes, while the requirement is over 1.3 million tonnes,” she said.