Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today on Rallis India Limited's Q3 and nine-month fiscal year 2026 earning call.

As mentioned, I have alongside myself our CFO, Mr. Bhaskar Swaminathan.

Let me begin by getting into a little bit of industry landscape, post which I'll discuss Rallis-specific developments. Talking about domestic market, agrochemical demand generally remains weak due to stressed demand drivers, particularly weather issues and low crop prices, leading to industry-wide volume decline.

Farmer interest in purchasing high-value product dropped due to lower crop and horticulture prices. South and West India saw soft demand decline, while East and North remains stable.

According to official data, all kharif crops, barring paddy, ruled 9% to 30% below the respective minimum support prices during harvesting period October to December 2025. Rabi acreage is marginally higher year on year, and channel stocks are slightly elevated.

Official dashboard confirms rabi acreage is up by 3% approximately for wheat, oilseed, and pulses as of Jan 2026 first week data, which is supportive for Q4 sell-out and early kharif placement. The sector is on track for 3% to 4% growth in fiscal year 2026 to about 2 9.6 to 10 billion dollar.

Seed category remains a structural 5% to 10% CAGR story. Volumes will benefit from stronger acreage and moisture, but margins are expected to remain stable to soft.

The market should favor low-cost producers with export breadth and tight working capital discipline. Pricing power as we speak, it stays limited as global competition intensifies with China continues the primary supplier, capping realizations.

Rapid resets in key technicals, particularly glyphosate, glufosinate, and paraquat can reprice on-hand inventory and compress margins. Export volumes are improving as inventory is normalized, but realizations remain capped.

Weaker currency would cushion margins, but not offset broad price pressure. On the weather side, El Niño-Southern Oscillation is expected to run neutral through winter, reducing tail risk from extreme abnormal anomalies.

IMD guidance points to neutral ENSO, which is El Niño-Southern Oscillation, normal through Dec, Jan, Feb 2026. Negative IOD is weakening, less chances of disruptive extremes, so that's a good news relatively.

The draft Pesticide Management Bill 2025 referencing quality control, lab accreditation, digital traceability, and stiffer penalties is a structural positive for organized players. Proposed seed bills measures, which include registration, QR tagging, keep compliance in focus and raise barriers to entry, particularly to smaller players over the medium term.

Global agrochemical market, particularly crop protection market, is valued at approximately 75 billion dollar in 2025, is projected to keep going at the CAGR of about 5% onward. Herbicides globally is the major category, followed by insecticide and fungicides.

Upside potential hinges on expected expanded acreage in Americas and regulatory clarity for new genomic techniques in the EU, while trade policies and Chinese pricing represent key uncertainties. Export recovery is gradual as global inventory is normalized.

US 2,4-D acid anti-dumping countervailing duties has reset landed cost and reset the herbicide trade flows. Global reliance on China persists as it supplies 99% of products like glyphosate outside the US, more than 80% of the glufosinate import, and 100% of US atrazine as per the '24-'25 data, exposing cost to tariff and policy shifts.

Chinese producers are pivoting towards branded formulation and overseas registration, increasing competition in value-added generics. This is something watch out for Indian players.

Leading seed companies prioritizing disease-resistant, drought-tolerant, and pest-resistant varieties through advanced biotechnology and gene editing innovations. Indian agrochemical exports to key markets like US and Brazil are growing at 5% to 6%, supported by destocking normalizations.

USDA WASDE data for December '25 showed an uptick in the stock-to-use ratio for Indian rice, but little change otherwise. Moving on to Rallis-specific developments, we had an encouraging quarter three performance despite unseasonal October rains and higher-than-normal reported crop damage.

Our Q2 Q3 fiscal year '26 revenue stood at 623 crore versus 522 of Q3 fiscal year '25. Overall EBITDA for Q3 stood at 58 crore, higher by 29% compared to Q3 of the previous year.

PAT stood at 2 crore versus 11 crore of Q3 of fiscal year '25, which is 80% lower than the previous year same year, but then we have to account for exceptional gain, which includes gratuity provision of 40 crore on account of Wage Code implementation; otherwise, it is significantly up. Across the technicals portfolio, we are continuously broadening our customer base and securing additional registration with global player to drive share gains.

In metribuzin, particularly this year, we achieved higher volume in Q3, surpassing Q3 of the previous year. Pendimethalin shows promising track, with long-term demand remaining steady.

Q3 fiscal year '26 volumes have surpassed Q3 fiscal year '25 volumes. Both metri and pendimethalin have done very well.

Hexaconazole and acephate volumes had constraints in Q3 in comparison to Q3 of previous fiscal. There has been overall improvement in the capacity utilization.

As far as the new launches are concerned, we have launched one herbicide, Fateh Next, during the quarter for the wheat. In nine months, if you look at total, we have introduced nine products, out of that seven were herbicide, two were fungicides.

We have also launched a new brand called NuQord under soil and plant health category. It's a biological platform covering biofertilizer, biostimulant, and biopesticide.

We have also announced partnership with Parayan Alliance for full page herbicide-tolerant rice technology in India. This should help our seed business to remain competitive in the marketplace.

We have recently unveiled Idea2Impact platform, which is a open innovation platform to co-create, validate, and scale farmer-centric solutions. It invites startups, researchers, and partners to collaborate with Rallis.

We have also few days ago launched an app called Sampark Plus app for unified field operations. This will act as a demand creation platform, both seed and crop care business.

We have been granted Indian patent for three-way mixtures for a wheat herbicide that contains metsulfuron, clodinafop, as well as metribuzin. We have also been granted US patent for mesotrione.

The near-term outlook remains positive, underpinned by healthy reservoir level, increased acreages, and stronger engagement with domestic and export customers. We are focused on long-term value drivers such as deepening customer-centricity, sharpening portfolio choices, accelerating product launches, expanding strategic alliances and farmer reach, and embedding digitalization across our operations.

This concludes my opening remark. Now I'll hand over to Bhaskar, our CFO, for a detailed analysis of the financial situation.

Over to you, Bhaskar.

Thank you, Dr. Gyanendra.

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today for our Q3 and nine months FY '26 earnings call. I'll walk you through our financial performance for the quarter, post which we shall commence the Q&A session.

Starting with the top line for the quarter, our Q3 FY '26 revenue stood at 623 crore as against 522 crore for the same period last year, resulting in overall growth of 19%. Overall volume growth has been 28%, with pricing degrowth by 8%.

Overall EBITDA for the Q3 FY '26 stood at 58 crores rupees, higher by 29% compared to Q3 of the previous year. Profit after tax at rupees 2 crores versus 11 crore of Q3 FY '25, which is 81% lower than the previous year same quarter.

Exceptional items include gratuity provision of 40 crore on account of Wage Code implementation, which has actually resulted into that PAT number. Crop care segment grew by 18% to 560 crore in Q3 FY '26 from 492 crore in Q3 FY '25, driven by volume expansion, new product promotion, and increased digital engagement.

Moving to seeds business, seeds revenue grew by 46% to 43 crores rupees in Q3 FY '26 from rupees 30 crore in Q3 FY '25, driven by volume growth, mainly due to paddy, mustard, and wheat. In the current quarter, we have achieved healthy product placements in paddy.

Soil and plant health category grew by 16% to 73 crore from 62 crore in Q3 FY '26 in comparison to Q3 FY '25, registering both price and volume growth. We progressed in compliance in majority of the states post successful migration of biostimulant production in-house.

The B2B business top line grew by 73% to rupees 123 129 crore from rupees 75 crore, and has shown promising growth driven by volume growth, expansion in customer base, and driving capacity utilization of our plants. The CSM business Q3 FY '26 revenue also displays positive run rate, lodging 26% growth to 46 crore from 37 crore earlier.

Moving into domestic B2C market, 13% growth in Q3 FY '26, registering rupees 391 crore revenue vis-à-vis rupees 347 crore in Q3 FY '25, which was driven by volume growth of 25%. Volume was driven by strong performance in fungicides, primarily supported by potato and cumin crops.

The negative price impact is due to liquidation of near-expiry materials. For the nine-month period, top-line revenue stood at rupees 2,441 crore, reflecting growth of 9% year on year.

Crop care revenue stood at rupees 1,991 crore, reflecting 8% growth year on year, driven by volume expansion despite price softening. Seeds revenue increased to rupees 450 crore, delivering 15% growth year on year, supported by cotton and maize, along with improved contribution from licensed products.

The B2C business recorded growth of 3%, delivering rupees 1,401 crore of revenue. The B2B business recorded growth of 22%, delivering rupees 590 crore of revenue, supported by volume growth and expansion of the customer base.

In crop care segment, expanding our customer base and product portfolio is strengthening business resilience. We are driving focused execution across the frontline and operations, optimizing the portfolio, rationalizing territories, eliminating overlaps, and simplifying costs across the value chain.

We remain disciplined on capital efficiency across both fixed and working capital. In seeds segment, our primary focus will center on five strategic crops: cotton, maize, millet, mustard, and rice, where selective concentration will drive operational scale and efficiency.

We aim to methodically expand our presence across these crops while prioritizing profitability at every stage. Our digital-led initiatives are accelerating targeted region penetration, with momentum remaining strong.

In parallel, we are rationalizing the portfolio and sharpening our focus on priority markets. At quarter end, our inventory levels remain slightly elevated in comparison to the same quarter of last year, and collections remain smooth.

We have healthy cash and liquid balance of rupees 455 crore as of 31st December. In summary, we are implementing various initiatives, and we are committed towards achieving consistent, competitive, and profitable growth.

That concludes our opening remarks. We can now commence the Q&A session.

Thank you.

Hi. Thanks for the opportunity.

Just a couple of questions. First, if you can give the volume price trend for the quarter in domestic B2C and international business?

A related question is we've seen a healthy placement in Q3 in the domestic business for us. Any color you can give in terms of the liquidation and the industry?

Because going into Q2 end, going into Q3, industry reported a lot of inventory in the system, any color you can give on that?

Bhaskar can give a specific number, but I can tell you, for example, there is a significant growth in our seed business compared to the same quarter last year. This is in spite of there was a weak mustard season, I think we are in good shape.

Our export business also has gone up significantly, where there's no risk. Correct?

Top line in export actually has grown by almost 73%. Seed there was a growth of 46%, soil and plant health 16%.

All those are good. The only challenge remains sometimes in domestic crop protection.

That has grown by 18%, and I think it's combination of our promotional activities, digital engagement, and some of the activities we have been taking. It combines with new launches.

I think we feel confident about what we have placed in the market. We are very careful in the way we track our basically placement and remainder of the inventory.

Two things: A, season is still on. A lot of sprays will happen in January, February, and March, we need to have a inventory in the market.

At the same time, we try to look at receivable situation because that's the best indicator of what is happening in the marketplace. At this point of time, it looks in line with what we should be doing.

Bhaskar, you want to answer the question on volume and price?

I think the question was mainly on how much it is coming for quality of placement as well as in terms of what is coming back. We are quite in control in terms of the returns, and that basically indicates the quality and focus with which we placed the market.

In terms of the quarter, volume has basically played 12% impact, and price has played negative 32% impact.

Sorry, how much you say on the price?

Price is about 32% impact. Though it is also offset by cost, positive of 12%, volume has played 12% positive.

This

is for the domestic B2C?

Yes.

Okay. On the soil and plant health segment, I think last quarter we were expecting approvals to come maybe by end of Q4, and a normalized environment starting into 2027.

The approval which we have got is just for us or generally for organized players in the industry, everyone? Is the issue by and large addressed for everyone else, please, or we have managed to get an early [unclear]?

Yeah. I think, see, in in our agriculture business, what you miss, you miss, right?

Having said that, whatever regulatory changes happened, they are by and large good for large organized players, and that is reflected in recovery we are having. Here we have grown both in price and volume, and we have been able to migrate our this to Fixes we taken, for example, one of the biostimulant, we had a challenge, we have moved the production in-house.

As a result, there is a growth of 16% in quarter three. I know quarter towards end of quarter one and quarter two were very challenging because of the regulatory constraints, we have addressed most of those issues now.

I guess, I cannot really comment about competition, but I'm sure every company is taking such such steps, particularly large organized players, they would like to fix their house.

Just last question. I'll come back in queue.

How large is the unorganized market was in the soil and health segment, or the biostimulant space?

See, I think it's a category which has six, seven subcategories. I would say very difficult to put numbers, but there are hundreds of players operating, let's put it that way, right?

The regional players, national players. I certainly see that number shrinking and more authentic players coming up in the marketplace.

Very difficult to give you a number, but it's too many.

Okay. Thank you.

Good luck.

Sure. Thank you for taking my question.

The first question is regarding the Chinese VAT rebate which would be discontinued. Now some of the products we export including say an acephate or ethion, etcetera.

How do you look at it in terms of the impact? I know formulations are not part of this, but in terms of technical exports, how do we see this play out for us going forward?

We don't do ethion. We only do acephate.

We do metribuzin. We do hexaconazole.

We do metalaxyl, those kind of products. I think this rebate thing is a new which is applicable from April.

Right. Right.

We have to understand. I certainly believe when they remove the incentive, by the month of April, how much they would have already supplied and have they supplied enough to cater to the markets.

I think we have to wait for how it will evolve. I think generally it's a positive movement to say.

It probably reflects the challenges Chinese companies face in terms of overcapacity and all. Maybe this is an attempt by Chinese government to really encourage consolidation of players there because China has also a lot of players, those who are into technical feed.

Many of them are actually migrating to what you call registering their own product and participating in direct formulations in market. I think you'll have to wait for some more information to filter in.

As I know, it is applicable only from April. Right.

It should certainly lead if there's not too much of production happening for a particular AI, it should lead to some price increase and some consolidation of players.

Sure. We've seen a very strong third quarter, albeit the base wasn't extremely high, but yet numbers are very robust.

Given that in the fourth quarter, do you anticipate dumping where it may have an impact on a quarter, or that is not something that we're seeing say in dispatches for Jan and Feb?

No, I think we have planned for a normal quarter. We don't advance sale, and we don't unnecessary delay the sale.

I think we go by the seasonal demand. I think fourth quarter is an important from: A, there is a crop on the ground; B, for us, cotton season begins again.

There's some element of when the government announces cotton seed price because cotton gets planted early in northern part of India, we have to start placing. There's also some bajra seed business which happens in quarter three.

We have factored everything, and there's some maize business as well. I think we have planned for the normal quarter.

Hopefully, we'll be able to sustain some momentum we have created.

Sure. Sir, just the final question.

In terms of our growth going forward, how do we envisage the deployment of the cash on balance sheet, because that continues to grow?

Cash in the balance sheet, obviously, one thing is obviously we need cash to meet our working capital requirement as we grow business. As we said, look, while we do not give a guidance, aspirationally we want to grow in double digit, and we also want to expand our margin.

Cash is helpful from that perspective because it also allows us to sometimes negotiate better prices, right? Depending on the situation, credit versus cash kind of situation.

Obviously, the one area which I have been talking, we keep seeking opportunities if we come across a good opportunity to grow inorganically any of the verticals we operate, three particular verticals, we want to use that cash for those purposes as well.

Sure, wishing you all the best.

Thank you.

Thanks for the opportunity. Sir, in the present presentation, you have mentioned some inventory liquidation in the fourth quarter.

What is the impact of this on our company, Rallis India?

Look, see, this you have to always place product in the market because it has to go from factory to C&F, C&F to distributor to retailer. Farmers also end up buying a few days in advance at least if they want to spray.

Product has to be in the market. I think the numbers reflect what has been actually consumed and what might be lying in the market.

We are hoping all of this will get liquidated. We will also be able to invoice some fresh inventory, which is an ongoing business.

Agriculture never goes completely silent in any part of the country. For example, Eastern region might start a little early, particularly Assam, Bengal, and all, tea plantations and all.

The season of apple starts early in Kashmir and all. I think it's a continuing business.

All we're watching when we declare a quarter number, we have to ensure that we are not pushing volume unnecessarily in the marketplace when there is no demand.

Sir. Thank you very much, sir.

Good morning, gentlemen. Thank you so much for taking my questions.

Just one quick clarification on the numbers first if I may, and by the way, thank you so much to Bhaskar and team for sharing the revenue breakdown, very helpful. Just to clarify of this 580 crore crop care revenue that you've reported for this quarter, is it correct to conclude that basically exports are 129, as Bhaskar mentioned, CSM 46, and B2C domestic 391?

I think that adds up to about 566, but are those the three main components, and what would the remaining piece be, if any?

There's a other small businesses which we don't add here. For example, we have a household pesticide business.

There is another small segment we have. These are the numbers he has given breakup for the majority general.

Okay. Okay.

These are the only three components. Soil and plant health is over and above this, right?

That is not part of crop care?

Soil and plant health we club with the crop care. I think when we say crop care, it has a crop protection domestic, exports, CSM, as well as soil and plant health.

Soil and plant health is about 73 crore.

Got it. Got it.

No, thank you. That's helpful.

Just on the seeds business, we've seen further reduction in losses there, as well as fairly healthy revenue growth this quarter. I know in the past, you've talked about getting the seeds business margins to significantly higher levels on a full-year basis, closer to 25% or so.

What exactly are the interventions we are making, and how confident do we feel that we are on track? By when could we sort of aspire to get close to that target?

I think seed business could be very chunky in growth depending on the new product launches. We had some momentum because of the North cotton hybrid, and now we have launched some products in maize and rice and bajra.

We are seeing some momentum. I think the margin expansion primarily will happen because of operating leverages.

We are well-staffed team. Cost of doing business basically will go based on the inflation.

When you have a new product, you're able to price it differently. If it's a good product, you're able to sell more faster.

Combination of new launches, expansion of the products we have got, and benefiting from operating leverages, these are the three levers I think will help us drive margin.

Right, sir. Any sort of aspirational timeline towards getting to that closer to mid-20s kind of margin level?

Obviously we always shy away from giving a guidance, but last year I said, look, aspirationally, in 5 years, I want to take my seed business closer to 1,000 crore, soil and plant health business I want to grow by 4x from where it was, 225 crore to 700, 800 crore. These two are relatively high-margin businesses.

Then obviously, CSM also is a high-margin business, though it is small. In B2C domestic as well as B2B export, we have to be competitive with the Chinese players.

We do get some brand premium in the domestic business. As I have been saying, aspirationally, I want to grow company in double digit from a revenue perspective and expand margin on overall blended basis to 500 basis points in 5 years or so.

I am on track, I believe. This year, we had some setbacks in kharif, right, because of the excessive rain which happened in the month of August and September as a result, some sprays were missed.

There was lot of setback for the companies operating in soybean and cotton herbicide segment. All of those things will keep happening.

The way I have internalized it, look, we have technically four segments, B2B, B2C within the crop protection, then I have a seed business and soil plant health. There's a small fifth segment, I would say, CSM.

They will not all fire. All of them are likely to fire at the same time.

All we have to ensure is that, no, we're doing the right things in each of those businesses so that we're ready whenever opportunity presents. Focus on R&D from a manufacturing standpoint of view, customer stand point of view to keep launching new products, looking at partnerships to win contracts in CSM space, looking at new registrations in export.

I think those are the things. For example, we launched this platform, Idea2Impact.

I think this will help us accelerate innovation because we believe, with our brand equity, we have that level of trust within the society. There are a lot of people, those who do innovation, they're not able to scale it up, take it from an idea to a product level because of the resource constraint.

I think some of those ideas also using to really start bringing new product, new ideas. We are spending on digital connect.

We talked about Sampark Plus app, which has gone live on Friday. That will make sure the efforts related to very focused, targeted work at the demand generation and connecting those villages we operate all the way up to retailers and distributors.

I think those are all the right efforts, and I guess combination of all of that, I think very difficult to predict segment-by-segment revenue, but all of them actually help in all the other areas, every area. Rest all we have to leave it to the season, and crop prices we don't control, rainfall we don't control.

We will do what is right if we stay focused on our business. We do what is in our control right, and then we leave it to the factors and be vigilant in the marketplace so that we're managing our receivables well, we're managing our inventory well without compromising on the growth opportunity.

Obviously, I talked about governance, leadership, bringing more leaders, more new ideas.

No, thank you. That's really helpful color.

Just one last thing if I may squeeze in. If you could please just share your outlook for the international business, sir, just in the context of all these tariffs and all of the uncertainty plus low crop prices and everything.

How is the demand environment looking for the upcoming calendar year, and maybe on the margin front as well, pricing/margins? Thank you.

Overall I would say we have done well in spite of the challenges in fiscal year '27. We are still assessing the situation because the new announcement from China and the new geopolitical context, we don't know how things will evolve.

At the same time, there has been softening of crop prices, particularly corn and soybean in Latin America. I think we will continue to watch the situation.

I don't want to give a what you call guidance on the international business. I know we have been able to recover from the setback we had in '24-'25.

Our focus is continue to seek registration, continue to seek partners, continue to add new customers. In fact, we have added more number of people on ground in international business so that we get more closer to what is happening in those countries and geography.

That's how we're managing. Difficult to tell how tariff situation will evolve.

I think there's a bit of a uncertainty around that, but I think last year, because it excluded technical, it did not hurt us much. How things will change, difficult to predict.

Very very uncertain environment right now. China, I think there was a news I was reading couple of days ago, year-on-year basis, China has produced more technicals, right, which means either there's a demand which is growing fast, or there's a build-up of inventory, restarting.

At this point of time, I see in the market inventory at the normalized level, and this volume pressure when it comes from China, and obviously, it keeps a pressure on the prices.

Yeah. Thank you.

Thank you so much, sir. Wish you all the best.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Good morning.

Sir, first on the seed business, can you just give some indication in terms of how have we planned the inventories for the Digvijay for the next year?

We have planned for enough inventory not only for Digvijay, for all the crops. This year, if you can see, in spite of the challenges we had on our supply side, we have been able to grow our revenue by 15% on year-on-year basis.

Last year, we did have challenges where seed production crop was not planted on time, and all the crop came at the same time. As a result, there was a delays in supplies, and rains came early.

It became very chaotic to manage the business in the month of April, May, and June. I think we have taken all the precautions.

All the things are in place to ensure that we have sufficient inventory to grow the business. I think we have momentum, and we have to capitalize on it.

Secondly, on the technical business Hello?

Yeah.

Sir, on the technical business, can you just give some qualitative comments on the gross margins that we currently are operating at and how do we see this panning out over the next two, three years in terms of internally what are we doing to improve our efficiency?

I think, obviously, we keep looking at how can we become A, raw material cost we have to keep looking at. The other area is basically ability to find customers where we can get more realization.

When I look at basically export business, I think there has been a significant expansion in our margin which has gone beyond 20%. It's a very very competitive place.

When I add the CSM business, I think it is falling in the range of our blended margin of about 30%. Seed obviously is a high-margin business for us as we have been saying.

It's really I would say challenges really on the margin front are primarily on export where we sell what you call catalog product. The other thing is that we have started doing is also domestic institutional business, which we don't talk.

Whatever AIs we produce, we also have opportunity to sell domestically. I think that's most competitive.

That's where we make lowest margin, but it ensures that our plants are running, and we improve our capacity utilization. We don't sell on losses.

We make probably mid-teens margin, but on a overall basis, if you say B2B business, when you look at the blended margin, it is in excess of 20%.

Okay. Thank you so much.

Thank you for the opportunity. We appreciate your comments around the strategy to expand the margins by about 500 bps in the next 5 years.

When I compare nine-month to nine-month basis performance, it seems that the gross margins have actually compressed by about a percent, maybe because of rising share of your B2B business. My question is, how would you see these margin expanding in the near term over the next one year or so, and what will drive that margin expansion?

I think there are couple of one-off items we had probably would not have impacted. For example, we were planning to launch a insecticide last year, and I keep talking about one product did not go as per the plan because when final product came out of the factory, there was some quality issues.

As a result, we had to take a provision. A lot of it is actually related to provisions we create for the inventory when it doesn't go as expected, right?

I would say majority are related to that. If you take one-off items, I would say we would have marginally improved.

Is it possible to quantify this impact?

This impact if you see is in excess of ₹10 crore roughly. Yeah.

Okay, ₹10 crores. Okay.

How would your expectations be for the next year? How much of gross margin expansion you think can come to Rallis on a blended basis?

Any insights on that will be useful.

One is gross margin. Other thing is really EBITDA.

When I talk about 500 basis point, we are talking about EBITDA margin improvement, right? EBITDA margin improvement to me is more important because that's what ultimately translate to PAT and shareholder value creation.

Because of diverse nature of business and competitiveness of the industry, I am not interested in losing on the market share because that's where business starts getting challenging. We are saying, okay, we can stay in the gross contribution range and marginally improve, but because of the operating leverage, we'll be able to sell more per person or per employee and as a result, we expand our EBITDA margin.

Our fixed cost actually will not grow as fast as your other business contribution comes in.

Most of this 500 bps would actually result from operating leverage?

Operating leverage.

What could be the blended utilizations of our plants? Any insights on that, sir?

This year, all across plants, our utilization has improved, and we're looking at various other initiatives, which I can't say at this point of time. I think this year has been significant improvement over last year.

Okay. The other question I had, you mentioned that you have been able to bring a bio product in-house that saves you from the regulatory challenges.

Can you make a comment on what is the exact status on the regulatory side on the bio fertilizers? How the situation has improved over the last 3 months, and do any significant challenges still remain with the industry on this side?

See, I think in countries like India, there'll always be some regulatory challenges because the way our system operates. I think by and large, I would say we are out of that situation.

For us, things are sorted. The other thing which I did mention is that, look, our seed team operate independent of crop care team.

We have also launched a new brand for soil and plant health, and within that brand of NuQord, we have started launching products in different categories of soil and plant health, and we are seeing a good traction. Soil and plant health will have two sales and marketing engine driving the product in the marketplace because there's a significant opportunity to sell to more farmers because there is some uniqueness of distribution and customers are different.

Other thing is that it's also better utilization of seed fixed cost because seed team carrying a new brand of soil and plant health, it only it gives us volume as well as double leverage, seed team is able to sell something beyond seed. It also keeps them connected to the farmers, because when you have to sell these products, you have to visit more frequently farmers and retail networks.

In a way, I think that solves some of the problem related to soil and plant health. A, I think smaller players will eventually get weeded out over a period of time.

We have instead of one channel to carry, we have two distinct channel to carry the product, and we keep adding products. Our back end, as you said, common back end, but front becomes you have two opportunities.

Okay. Is the registration process and other things are smooth now?

Is it working on speed for registering all of these bioside?

You can't say with speed, but yes, it is sorted for us.

Understood. One last question, if I may.

Can you please tell us what could be your dependence for technical procurement from China on the blended basis?

On blended basis, still it is more than 40%, and the challenge is not that all of that can be replaced. Not only it is there, it will continue to be there, because some of the products probably given the complexity and the stage of product, at what lifecycle they are.

I am not one who says that, no, we'll be completely moving away from China. I think we have to have more partners in China to ensure that we continue to have access to product for some of the things we do.

When the China government says they're going to remove the export rebates, how much of that exposure would be for you when you think about the procurement from China?

This is applicable post-April, let's wait for more details to emerge. At this point of time, I think it's not negative for us.

It's common for everybody. It will not apply only to us.

Yeah. Okay.

Sure. Thank you so much, and all the best.

Yeah. Thank you.

Good morning, and thank you very much, and congratulations on the performance, given the challenging environment. Sir, if you look at your third-quarter B2C growth of 13%, how would it compare with the overall industry growth in the same segment or category?

See it's very difficult to comment about industry, because in this, not many people have reported the numbers. I don't want to speculate, but I think generally rabi has been better compared to previous rabi.

Depending on the portfolio, depending on the crop segment, people operated. For example, I can tell you, we have done very well in crops like potato and cumin with fungicides and all.

Somebody who had a wheat herbicide, strong portfolio, wheat herbicide companies would have done well. Again it's crop.

If somebody was depending on the grape, I think grape has been a challenging crop. Cumin area dropped, as a result it has been challenging.

It's very crop-specific and portfolio-focused. There's no one comment I can make about what is happening in the industry.

Different players would have got positively or negatively impacted depending on the crop they participated.

Okay. If we look at your aspiration numbers for seeds and soil and health, what would be the growth CapEx you have to invest to achieve these numbers, excluding working capital?

In terms of your future, focus on ROCE, would you see these two businesses driving your improvement in ROCE, given the investment you need to do and the kind of growth you can expect in these two businesses?

I think coming back to your question on CapEx, I think I have said it, and I want to reiterate that, look, unless I have a very firm contract to make something for somebody, we are not going to put any significant CapEx of ahead of what do you call market demand. I think we have enough steel on the ground, we have enough plants and equipments on the ground to continue to grow.

Having said that, there'll always be sustenance CapEx, which will continue to be required, and that's all we have planned at this point of time.

On the CSM business, you say the margins around 13%. If you look at your again aspirational targets in CSM, do you see some traction in terms of getting higher-value contracts which will improve the margins and return on capital for the CSM business?

What would be the aspirational revenue targets say in the next 3 to 5 years, given the kind of opportunity that Indian companies see in CSM overall?

Look, when it comes to CSM, they're quite a few established player, and I guess they have built their reputation being a CSM player, it's not easy to take away business from them. What we have to see is that what is new coming in terms of patented products or unique opportunities, and that's where we are always in touch with, and we are, I would say, rather more active in keeping in touch with those players and we do have some small opportunities in hand at this point of time.

They are at a different stages of execution. I think some of those opportunities will start seeing its contributing in a small manner from '27 onward, but there's no large big molecule opportunities available even in the market.

That business, I think, for example, with our existing partner, there's a new molecule coming. We probably will end up making for them.

There are no 500 crore opportunities, I would say, at this point of time, which are available in it.

Thank you very much, Dr. Shukla and Bhaskar.

Wish you all the best. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks, everybody.