World champions
India’s unique dairy industry
India’s unique dairy industry
World’s second largest dairy business quit India in 2018. It failed as it did not understand the dairy ecosystem of dairy farmers of India. India is world’s largest producer and consumer of milk.
Danone India wanted to establish their international structures and processes. Outside of India an average dairy farmer owns between 50 animals (France) and 250 animals (USA) . An average Indian dairy farmer is a woman, owning up to 2 animals. There are 75 million dairy farmers in India. Danone tried to set up centralised operations without the distributors. It failed to build relationships with the farmers unlike Amul. It also priced the product higher than its competitors. Even market leader Amul does not own more than 10% of market share.
As per Livemint: “Danone has decided to rationalise its product portfolio in India to allow for accelerated investments and a sharper focus on growing its nutrition portfolio which is more than 90% of the business, and where the company already enjoys leadership position,” the company said in the statement.
It is coming back. It invested INR 182cr in local Yogurt maker Epigamia. It has continued to run the food business with brands such as Farex.
Dig more: How India became world’s largest milk producer Link