Riding The Recession

Mid-day
Thursday, Oct 1, 1998
Riding The Recession
Balaji Rao, MD, Venky’s (India) Ltd.
‘Explore new markets to avoid a cutback in production’

Maintain and strengthen employee morale and confidence levels by stressing that recession is a global phenomenon and not an industry specific or organisation specific malady; that it is only a temporary phase and the industry will bounce back. When the going is tough, it is important to hold together and not fall apart

Strengthen core competencies within the organisation and focus on fundamental strengths like research and development, product quality and customer relations and a nationwide distribution network.

Take a closer look at organisational deficiencies , cut excess fat and wasteful or avoidable expenses.Simultaneously, introduce more cost-effective production, communication and funds management systems.

Explore new markets – particularly export markets – to avoid a cutback in production, even if exports result in a break even. Cutting back production could be viewed as a surrender to recessionary forces and may have a demoralising effect on the organisation.

Keep up a continuing dialogue with the government, policy-makers and opinion-makers to ensure a more industry friendly policy with regard to imports, exports, tariffs and taxation. The full potential of the poultry industry can be realised only when such enabling policies are made available; a period of recession is the right time to do so and this point needs to be emphasised