Karuturi Global
Karuturi Global Limited | |
---|---|
legal form | Limited |
founding | 1994 |
Seat | Bangalore , India |
management | Sai Ramakrishna Karuturi |
sales | 3056000000 Rs. (34.9 million euros ) |
Branch | Flowers |
Website | www.karuturi.com |
As of March 31, 2015 |
The Indian group of companies Karuturi Global is the world's largest producer of cut roses .
The growing areas are in Ethiopia , Kenya and India. The group has hundreds of thousands of hectares , of which nearly 300 hectares are under glass . It produces around 555 million flower stems annually, which are almost exclusively exported to customers in highly developed countries (including the Netherlands, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Bahrain, Oman, Dubai, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Brunei, USA, Canada and, to a lesser extent, India).
Business areas
Cut roses
The company, headquartered in Bangalore , India , was founded in 1994 by Sai Ramakrishna Karuturi and initially developed into the country's largest producer of cut roses, but still small by international standards.
In September 2007, one of the three largest cut rose farms in Kenya, Sher Agencies in Naivasha , was taken over by Dutch previous owners (company name since Sher Karuturi ), including the first division football club Sher Agencies FC (since 2008 Sher Karuturi Sports ) and its home stadium. As a result, Karuturi Global grew into the world's largest producer, exporting over a million roses per day at peak times (market share in Europe 9%). Sher Karuturi alone employs over 3,000 people. The first owner of the company had company apartments built (large families often live in a few square meters), their own kindergartens and schools as well as a health station.
2014 liquidity crisis in Kenya
In the past, however, there were several strikes and other protests by Kenyan employees, which were justified by poor working conditions and late wage payments. In 2013, the existence-threatening extent of Karuturi's liquidity problems in Africa became fully apparent. The workers have not received any wages since November 2013. For years there has been a case against Karuturi for tax evasion in the millions (the value of roses exported to Dubai is said to have been given too low to the Kenyan tax authorities). In India, too, the listed Karuturi Group has been penalized several times by the financial market supervisory authority SEBI for violating rules.
The situation escalated when the packaging supplier Allpack Industries, which is part of the IPS group of the Aga Khan Development Network , publicly threatened to close the company because of unpaid bills. As a result, business partners stopped deliveries and services, and electricity and water were also blocked (even for the social facilities and the rose farm's infirmary). The operation therefore practically came to a standstill in the middle of the high season before Valentine's Day . The humanitarian situation of the workers is dire. There are statements from workers on the farm that they have to prostitute themselves in order to be able to feed their family. Children no longer go to school because their parents cannot pay the school fees. The water barrier affects the hygienic situation, the outbreak of epidemics is feared. The farm workers' union suspects that Karuturi managers are secretly transferring remaining capital abroad. In February 2014 Karuturi Kenya was placed under its administration by CfC Stanbic Bank (part of Standard Bank ), which is also a creditor , and the management changed. This procedure was deemed arbitrary by a court order of the High Court of Kenya and was therefore initially suspended. However, after it turned out that the credit agreement expressly provides for the administration of the bank to be taken over by agents of the bank in the event of default, the court overturned the decision. In the meantime, the first interested parties have registered to take over the farm.
Agriculture and food processing
In order to make its business more independent of the previously dominant product cut roses , Karuturi Global has been expanding its activities to the areas of agriculture and food processing since 2008. In India a production of cucumbers for canning was established. In Ethiopia, more than 300,000 hectares of arable land were leased for the production of cereals, palm oil and biofuel in the Gambela region near the border with South Sudan, which the government had offered on extremely favorable terms because Ethiopia was unable to cultivate the land itself. The approach brought the company accused of land grabbing . In the event of successful management, Karuturi predicted the possibility of becoming one of the ten largest food producers in the world within a few years. However, significant problems have arisen along the way. For example, the agricultural machines purchased for cultivation have proven to be inadequate and stand around useless. In the meantime, a cooperation with American agricultural machinery companies is sought, which have more know-how for such large surface cultivation. As Karuturi himself admits, the management made various wrong decisions. And the first maize harvest in 2011 fell victim to an unforeseen heavy flood, despite previous investments in dam construction. Development aid banks refused to provide funding due to criticism of Karuturi. In the spring of 2013, however, the company announced that an undisclosed sovereign wealth fund had committed a loan of over $ 100 million.
Information technology
Another new business area of the group is information technology . In 2007, the Indian Internet service provider Estel Communications was taken over (since then Karuturi Telecom); in April 2013, however, Karuturi withdrew from this business area. An online auction platform for roses was also set up.
Web links
- Karuturi Global website
- Interview with Sai Ramakrishna Karuturi
- Case study on Karuturi from the London Business School
- Dossier with critical press articles about Karuturi , farmlandgrab.org (a website of GRAIN )
- The world on sale - Planète à vendre , documentary by Alexis Marant , u. a. via Ram Karuturi
Individual evidence
- ↑ Annual Report 2014/15 ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Karuturi: Will buy Sher for EUR 50 million
- ↑ Karuturi: Takes over Sher in Kenya
- ↑ Ram Karuturi mulls taking his rose-to-maize company private - Business Today, April 14, 2013
- ↑ Rose producer in court ( Memento of the original dated February 22, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . April 26, 2013
- ^ Karuturi guilty of tax evasion . GRAIN / Tax Justice Network. April 22, 2013
- ↑ Karuturi Global wins reprieve in Kenyan tax claim . Business Standard, December 12, 2013
- ↑ Sebi imposes Rs 40 lakh fine on Karuturi Global's entities . Economic Times, July 3, 2013
- ↑ Karuturi's Valentine's Day set to be on a sour note ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . Business Standard, February 13, 2014
- ↑ Kenya: Turbulence near Karuturi
- ↑ 'Karaturi has no business being in the flower industry' , farmlandgrab.org
- ^ Pain, misery as Karuturi flower workers unpaid for months . Standard Digital News, February 8, 2014
- ↑ Workers cry foul as flower firm falls under receivers . The Star, February 12, 2014
- ↑ Karuturi flower farm put under receivership , Standard Digital News, February 11, 2014
- ^ Court restrains receivers from Karuturi , Capital Business, February 12, 2013
- ↑ Receivers now allowed to run Karuturi flower firm . Standard Digital News, February 13, 2014
- ↑ Karuturi Global goes into agriculture
- ↑ Favorite of investment firms , Amnesty International Germany
- ^ Indian investors are forcing Ethiopians off their land . The Guardian, Feb. 7, 2013
- ↑ Ethiopia's Farm Investment Plans Falter on Flood Plain . Bloomberg , November 26, 2013
- ↑ Karuturi to Borrow From Sovereign Fund After First Ethiopia Crop . Bloomberg, March 28, 2013
- ↑ Karuturi Global divests from non-core ISP biz . Business Line, April 22, 2013