The ongoing Pandemic has badly battered the economy. Does infrastructure hold the key to revive the Indian economy? Your views
Investment in infrastructure could prove to be an important way to revive the Indian economy. India’s goal of becoming a USD5 trillion economy is heavily dependent on the completion of critical infrastructure under the National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP) that includes integrated multi-sector infrastructural projects with the aim of improving the overall quality of life. Therefore, the success of the post-covid-19 economic revival will rely on three important aspects that support the NIP – human capital, innovative funding models and greater technological integration. Small traders, MSMEs are key to the revival of the Indian economy. Liquidity and deferred investment are some of the major barriers to their growth. The government will have to infuse cash into their deferred investments and reinforce the “Make in India” movement to propagate their growth.
How are you adapting to the ‘New Normal’?
Godrej & Boyce was already working on various digital platforms since before the arrival of Covid-19. This helped in a seamless shift to the “New Normal” without any drastic or uncomfortable changes for both internal and external stake holders.Given Godrej & Boyce’s strong reputation for being future ready across businesses and sectors, we, at Godrej Material Handling sensed the need for remote or digital assistance ahead of time and launched our product manuals on a digital platform which both our channel partners and customers can easily access. Thanks to this, we were able to provide effective remote assistance to dozens of customers even during the lockdown and will continue to do so going forward. We were already using cloud services, hence there was no disruption in terms of data access for our team, which was one of the major challenges faced by many industries. Our team was already accustomed to virtual meetings and hence we could extend the same to our customer meetings without the need for any training or upskilling of the workforce during the time of the pandemic.Our rental fleet ensured daily sanitization of the equipment andprovided for a Covid insurance cover for the operators. This helped us win a lot of goodwill during the pandemic.
What are your views on the need to adapt and remould the infra activities as per the New Normal to spur the economy and the MHE sector?
There is growing awareness of the positive impact on productivity through the use of material handling equipment in the manufacturing industry. Manufacturers are increasingly focusing on improving efficiency of their material movement, both inbound and outbound, in order to increase outputs and remain competitive. With increased palletization of goods across the industry, the material movement using mechanized handling equipment is much faster and safer. The scarcity of labour, job opportunities available in the service sector and the rising cost of land is driving the demand for forklift trucks even among MSME companies. Despite the sharp slowing of economic activity during the lockdown, India’s forklift industry revived late but reached the same level as the year before the lockdown. The major growth drivers have been the pharma, e-commerce and modern retail sectors. Furthermore, much of this growth came due to buying by MSME companies who faced labour challenges due to possible labour migrations during the initial lockdowns and fear of the pandemic. They had to mechanize handling operations to drive throughput in their operations. Given the growth that we have witnessed at Godrej Material Handling, a business of Godrej & Boyce, we are confident that the industry will continue to grow at least at 8-10% over the next few years.
How can the government handhold the MHE sector in this Pandemic time?
Material Handling Equipment should be awarded the status of an ‘essential industry’ because it supports all manufacturers, including those making medical and essential goods, in their supply chain. The Indian government fortunately continues to raise emission norms to curb pollution, but it currently applies to equipment Made in India. These should be made applicable to any equipment operating in India, irrespective of its country of origin. Similarly, BIS standards for material handling equipment need revision to reflect developments in more advanced markets and also ought to apply to all equipment sold in India irrespective of country of origin. The safe load that can be lifted by a human being is limited to 20 kg. This needs to be enforced as a law. Standardisation and adoption of pallets is another area where the industry needs to be encouraged. The government is keen to raise safety consciousness and safety standards. Trained and certified operators for all types of powered material handling equipment would serve to dramatically improve safety in the factory and warehouse. The Government can contribute by making such requirements mandatory.
What are the finance schemes you offer to suit varying requirements of the prospective customers?
Godrej Material Handling, through RenTRUST its rentals business, offers rental options ranging from a month to a couple of years. We have also tied up with financial institutions for lease or loan options so that our customers have easy and ready access to the best market interest rates. This has helped create a win-win situation for the customers and us.
The Pandemic has further expedited technologic advancement such as minimum human intervention by integrating IoT, AI. Towards this, what are the R&Ds going on at your end?
Owing to the pandemic, factors such as consolidation of warehouses, shrinking land availability and non-availability of semi-skilled/unskilled workforce have indeed advanced the adoption of various kinds of forklift trucks in warehouse operations. Godrej, over the last 5-7 years, has been very focused in developing a wide portfolio of fork trucks that are specially designed to work in warehouses. We are capable of addressing almost all handling needs of Indian warehouse operators. Technologies such as fork trucks integrating with warehouse management systems or otherwise known as fleet management systems are also gaining momentum as warehouse operations are growing in scale and complexity. We offer our customers our own fleet management systems -Godrej Safelog to monitor fleet health, provide proactive or predictive maintenance and optimize fleet size. All product manuals and service support are already available on digital platforms to customers.
How do you see the economy, opportunities and challenges in this pandemic situation and please give us a brief idea about the strategies outlined to tap in the future potentials?
The shift to online buying that resulted out of the pandemic has made e-commerce gain a new, higher level of consumer demand that will persist in the foreseeable future. Moreover, industries were affected by a shortage of labour and today, the need to maintain social distance in the workplace is higher than ever before. Both these factors drove the need to adopt mechanized handling in various forms. We also expect customers to show interest in IoT based solutions to monitor equipment health, receive alerts, monitor fleet productivity, ensure timely servicing, etc. This will also lead to new business models and very different solutions for customers.
Due to an increase in warehouses the demand for electric material handling equipment has increased. Industries governed by strict norms such as Food & Beverage and Pharma, were already using electric equipment, however, we have recently seen the increase in demand in other industries for their internal as well as inter-plant movement thanks to our outdoor duty forklift truck.We will continue to introduce new products and services in the market and invest in developing new technologies to facilitate our customers to increase their productivity and safety at their workplace. We are also coming up with a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility which will be operational next year.
