Indian grape and pomegranate farmers have a new packhouse to send their produce to. Magnus Farms is a new company that is stepping into the industry at a difficult time. Pomegranate production has dropped by 70% due to untimely rains and grape exporters have had a terrible year last year, and therefore are cautious this season. Magnus Farms tries to offer farmers more stability, by providing access to better health care for both the farmers and their families.
After having worked in the fresh produce industry in India for the past decade, Girish Sarda decided to create his own brand, with its own packhouse and vision. “I've been working with national and international companies for many years and have been successful in creating new markets, besides developing their existing markets, to sell Indian quality produce. India is a great source for quality agriculture products and with my knowledge and experience, I caught hold of the exact nerve of the international as well as national market and thought that I could justify the hard work of the Indian growers by giving them the best and right price of their produce.”
“For the last decade I’ve worked with other exporter companies help them to develop their brand with good volumes of around 1.5 million boxes in 100 days of grapes and pomegranate export season, but the facilities were rented and I found it difficult to manage 4-5 facilities to complete the program. And, thus an idea of having our own facility was born around a few years back. I started working towards it step-by-step, it was my dream to excel in my career by establishing our own brand called Magnus Farm for Indian produce in the international market.” Sarda explains.
Magnus Farms isn’t a solo entity, it presents itself as an association between growers and exporters. To offer the farmers more than what was already available to them, Sadra states that a packhouse in the center of Nashik was built: “The unique selling point of Magnus Farm is the fact it’s an association between growers and the professional experienced team in the export of produce. These growers have been working with us for many years and would like to be part of the export business, by supplying their quality produce to the supermarkets. Our new packing facility is situated in the center of the production area of Nashik, which cultivates about 90% of the Indian grapes that are exported. It's a huge facility using state-of-the-art technology; having a capacity of around 90-100 MT packing per day and having the scope to double the capacity along with other processed food production. The facility also has access to state-of-the-art machinery from Germany and other equipment from various international suppliers. It has been built with all international norms in mind.”
Sarda has taken an extra step by providing farmers and their families with a Health Card, giving them access to better healthcare. “In the first year of the business itself, we have launched “Magnus Kisan (Farmer) Health Card” for our growers, their families and workers to cover their medical emergencies. As of now, nobody has such CSR activity in Indian produce marketing. We as Magnus Farm desire our growers and workers stay healthy and never ever face any medical emergency. Having this card in their pocket gives them access to better facilities and cost-effective treatment in Nashik.”
As the company is new, it’s full of ambition and goals for coming years: “Our goal is to further strengthen our association with the growers. Not only for grapes and pomegranates, but in the coming years our focus will also be on other fruits, vegetables and processed food. Secondly, we aim to establish ourselves in the international market by supplying quality produce to our existing supermarkets and add more retailers in the existing market into our basket. We’d also like to enhance and spread our presence over the world sooner as a first choice for international buyers.” Sarda states.
As Magnus Farms will handle pomegranates in their packhouse, Sarda has seen a worrying season so far, as rains have cause significant losses to the crop: “This year’s situation with pomegranate production is disastrous as 70% of the crops were lost due to untimely heavy rains last October. Normally, we export 35-40 containers during December to March, but this year up until now, not a single shipment has been sent out. Heavy rainfall caused less availability, majorly for small sizes and some internal browning. We hope there will be some window in the Asian market for February to June of this year and will plan our next harvest for European market.”
The Indian grape season was very rough last year, and this year seems to be just as challenging, causing farmers to be more cautious about the season. “Last year there were multiple hurdles for Indian grapes export, which had a large impact and caused a lot of the financial losses. This year growers and exporters are very cautious about the export, as many EU countries are under lockdown, as well as UK being fully locked down until the end of February. Until now, our export shipments are between 30% and 50% less than they were last year during the same period for EU and Russia respectively. We had rains in the first week of January and are now experiencing cold weather in the night, resulting in uneven brix levels in a bunch of grapes. However, the eating quality and shelf life of the grapes is much better than it was last season. We expect the situation will improve during week 5 or 6, as the weather forecast is showing some increase in temperature for next week.” Sarda concludes.
