US firm Kemin, operating in India for over 15 years through a facility near Chennai, will expand beyond the poultry and dairy areas by unveiling products and services for aqua farming sector next month.
Announcing the foray, Kemin Industries South Asia Pvt Ltd senior vice president Samraj Jeyachandran on Monday said taht the company would be launching five products in April. A network of technical teams and laboratories, including a few satellite labs in Andhra Pradesh, is to be established to support the aqua farmers, he said, adding the services are to be offered free of cost. The satellite labs will be connected to the Chennai lab.
On the investments, the senior VP (animal nutrition and health) said (about $5-10 million) were planned over the next few years. Kemin’s investments in India, including the plant in Gummidipoondi catering to Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Bangladesh, are around $23 million. The company was also setting up a laboratory in Ambattur, Chennai.
The proposed products will help in production of better quality shrimps without residues such as antibiotics or heavy metals. Stating this, he pointed to the problems faced by exporters a couple of years ago when Japan found ethoxyquin (anti-oxidant) content in the shrimps beyond permissible limits. The market for products targeted at the aquaculture in India is around Rs.600 crore, but hardly penetrated, he said.
