The Indian agrochemical sector is currently a market of close to $6 billion and also holds a lot of space for growth. Especially with the growth levels that have happened in the past few years, this industry can become one of the largest agrochemical countries in the world. Poised perfectly in such a thriving industry is GSP Crop Science Private Limited, one of the few Indian agrochemical companies that is present in all three verticals – Domestic Brand, Domestic B2B and Exports. This allows the company to mitigate the risk, for instance, if one of the verticals is going down, it can stay aggressive in the other verticals to stay on track and keep up its revenue goals.
Unparalleled Quality!
Time and again, GSP has been offering the best crop solutions to its customers and nothing less! These crop solutions include technical grade ingredients, insecticides, fungicides, herbicides, intermediates, biopesticides, seed-treatment chemicals and public health products. A team of more than 900 experienced employees across all sites of Ahmedabad and Baroda, Gujarat-India, ensure that these solutions are manufactured in the best possible way and with top-notch quality. Bhavesh Shah, Managing Director, GSP Crop Science, adds, “We have a very talented R&D team that is extremely efficient and with the help of our team we have filed for over 140 patents. We have successfully received around 40 till date!”
GSP Crop Science ensures that all its products reach the customers through 23 Chemicals & Fertilizers Depots and more than 7900 dealers across India besides successfully exporting them in 45 countries. To enhance business capabilities and effective internal controls, the company has invested in modern ERP System – SAP, which supports real-time operations and better intelligence on data analysis for efficient and effective business decision making.
With a 37-year-old legacy, GSP Crop Science takes sustainability very seriously and hence, is working towards a ESG plan that can help them prepare for a greener future. Earlier, the company deployed ETP process plants at its manufacturing units, ensuring no stones were left unturned. When asked about the scenario of Indian market, Bhavesh asserts, “The Indian market has started accepting a variety of new products. Moreover, the Indian companies along with the support of our government have started seeing new molecules being introduced to the Indian market at a very high rate with great success”.
Bhavesh started working in the agrochemical industry since he left college and has been in this industry for almost 30 years. His father – Vrajmohan R. Shah, laid the foundation for GSP way back in 1985! Since then, it has been a family-owned business and the 3rd generation took hold recently. Bhavesh says, “My father has always been my inspiration and the person who not only created the foundation of the company but also its values that we have been adhering to!”
Future Plans
From an agrochemical trading company, GSP Crop Science is proud to have grown into a manufacturing company that produces 21 technical products across its manufacturing sites. In fact, GSP was the first manufacturer of Diafenthiuron in India back in 2011. For the future, the company is planning on setting up new manufacturing plants in Dahej in the coming few years to reduce its dependency on other countries such as China. Moreover, its plan is to go from being 60-70% dependent to 20-30% dependent!
Tirth Shah, Executive Director, GSP Crop Science
The Indian agrochemical industry has been growing significantly over the last year few years where farmers are becoming more preventive in terms of using pesticides rather than sticking to treatment-based usage of pesticides. They have been understanding the fact that using pesticides in the right way and with the right equipment can yield incredible results compared to treatment-based usage. Since farmers are slowly adapting to the advancements and learning seamlessly, there is a massive potential for growth of the agrochemical industry in India.
COVID-19 Pandemic
There wasn’t any significant impact of the pandemic on us since food has always been an essential component of our lives. We continue to follow the same strategies and procedures while looking forward to a phenomenal growth in the future. We also believe that agrochemicals must be used more than pesticides by farmers since these are crop protection chemicals and are developed with processes akin to which are followed in a pharmaceutical company.
For our employees, we envision providing them a better work-life balance, benefits, and opportunities even in the coming years. Since remote working was successful during the pandemic, we aim to hire diverse talents not just from India but abroad too into GSP. Most importantly, we ensure to work in a task-based manner and not timely manner.
Expertise
My perspectives are based on what I’ve seen in the industry and the knowledge I’ve gained from interactions with farmers and customers. I focus on acquiring businesses for GSP, especially from the South and North American markets with the help of highly skilled teams. For the road ahead, we assure to provide better quality products to our farmers and create more sustainable chemicals. We also aim to plunge into agrotech industry while focusing on bringing in improvements in every niche sector of the agrochemical industry. Moreover, the main plan of GSP is to outshine as a balanced agrochemical solutions company globally in all sectors of agriculture!
Haresh Chaturvedi, Chief Transformation Officer, GSP Crop Science
Agrochemical sector is forecasted to grow at around 8% CAGR during 2022- 2027 while India’s consumption of pesticide is 0.6 kg/ hector against global consumption of 2.3 kg/ hector. Clearly, there are multiple opportunities for growth. The agrochemical market is majorly captured by multinationals and in the remaining share there are many mid & small-sized industries. To compete in such scenarios, we need to hold competent human resources and it is no mean feat to attract talents to this sector. Such challenging situations encourage us to work hard and etch an impact in the organization.
GSP is at the juncture from where it needs to go on an accelerated path of growth. In the journey of human capital growth, culture change stands as one of the prime factors. While technology can aid this growth, talent stands-out as the most essential factor. With 32+ years of exposure to various industries, I ensure to deploy whatever learning I’ve gained directly or indirectly for the aspiration of GSP on their growth targets.
Solutions at Each Step of Farming
We have developed an app called Riddhi, which is designed to facilitate the sales & marketing employees of our company for their day-to-day field activities. This application is designed with latest mobile technology and utmost security of data using the industry’s best UI/UX. Some of its features include Pending Order Approvals, Pending Claim Approvals, MY Day Status & Current Check In, and Area Performance – Sales, Collection & Aging Graphs.
We also use Microsoft Teams and other convenient social media platforms to communicate with all our employees. As a result, every employee feels connected with the organization and also gets information on the click of a button.
COVID-19 Pandemic
The pandemic created a shortage of manpower at the farm level and non-availability of manpower at the field level, which impacted the production and supply of agrochemical market. As an organization, we stayed sensitive towards the surroundings and agile to learn and adopt new changes which were already being implemented. Moreover, a lot of technologies came into play during the pandemic which now support the employees in completing the tasks faster than before and making them feel more relaxed and spend time with family too.
SWIKAR is an inclusive policy for LGBTQ Community from GSP Crop Science with Partners' Benefits policy. This is going to partner all our employees as equivalent to spouses and their legally adopted children as dependent regardless of sexual orientation and marital status, with all benefits, including insurance coverage, leaves, social security, and retirement benefits, that are permitted by law.For the road ahead, the common goals of GSP are enhancing the brand’s reach in the market, hiring more competent talents, and shifting from a people-centric to system-centric approach.
