Amul posts group turnover of Rs 61,000 cr in FY22 on milk & ice-cream biz

Post pandemic recovery results in addition of Rs 8,000 crore in annual turnover

Celebrating 75th year of its cooperative movement, Amul has clocked a group turnover of Rs 61,000 crore for financial year (FY) 2021-22, further consolidating its position as the largest food and FMCG brand in India.

Currently ranked as the eighth largest dairy organisation in the world, the Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), which owns and markets products under the brand name Amul, added another Rs 8,000 crore to its group turnover in 2021-22.

According to the federation, the growth in its turnover came on the back of rapid post-pandemic recovery in out-of-home consumption and demand from restaurants, catering, travel and hospitality segments.

"As we move beyond the pandemic, consumers are rewarding us by displaying higher preference for brand Amul. As out-of-home consumption returns to normalcy, restaurants are witnessing higher footfalls, travel and tourism has resumed and so have functions and gatherings. The combined impact of all these factors is resulting in high growth across most product categories," said R S Sodhi, managing director of GCMMF.

According to Sodhi, while Amul's milk-based beverages business grew by 36 per cent in value terms, its ice-cream business also saw a sharp revival with a more than 50 per cent value growth in 2022. This was despite the peak summer season of 2021 being impacted by the second wave of Covid.

"Our flagship brand Amul Butter grew by 17 per cent, while our Ghee business grew by more than 19 per cent, both in value terms. We achieved 17 per cent value growth in Amul long life milk, 44 per cent value growth in Amul Cream, 24 per cent value growth in Amul Dahi, 18 per cent value growth in fresh Buttermilk and impressive 12 per cent value growth in our largest product category, Amul fresh milk.

As part of its product innovation initiatives, Amul also launched products like High Protein Lassi, High Protein Buttermilk, Speciality Cheeses, Amul Peanut Spread, a wide range of fresh ethnic Indian milk-based mithai and Amul Butter-based bread, cookies and bakery products in multiple markets.

After the federation's 48th Annual General Body Meeting on Tuesday, GCMMF chairman Shamalbhai Patel stated that the cooperative achieved 18.46 per cent growth in turnover in FY'22, higher than the 16 per cent CAGR in turnover over the last 12 years.

“Over the last 12 years, our milk procurement has increased by a phenomenal 190 per cent. This impressive growth was a result of the high milk procurement price – which has increased by 143 per cent during this 12 year period – paid to our farmer-members. The highly remunerative price helped us retain farmers’ interest in milk production; and better returns from dairying have motivated them to enhance their investments in this sector,” Patel added.

Rise in milk procurement has also led to Amul basing its expansion plans on future procurement projections.

Typically, Amul incurs a capital expenditure (capex) of Rs 800-1000 crore annually for capacity expansion. "We are also expanding in fresh products (milk, curd and buttermilk) and a new dairy plant, with an investment of Rs 500 crore, will come up in Rajkot. Within two years, large dairy plants will also come up in Baghpat, near Delhi, Varanasi, Rohtak and Kolkata," he added.

With the pandemic necessitating digitisation across sectors, the dairy co-operative is also leveraging new-age technology to scale the supply chain across its key business verticals and replace manual interventions with digital apps, said GCMMF vice-chairman Valamji Humbal.

“In the milk value chain, we have recently introduced several new technologies, which are giving good results. We recently built Asia’s biggest milk powder plant. We are also working on a technology which can store perishable Indian milk-based sweets and desserts for up to 45 days & beyond," Humbal added.