Nichrome to focus on agro- packaging business

Nichrome India Limited, a packaging machinery manufacturer and a player in VFFS machines in India, is focusing on agricultural packaging sector and expanding its base across India. Over 80 per cent of the seed packaging in India is done using Nichrome Machinery, the company claims. In every season including rabi or kharif, Nichrome machines manage to pack around 50 million pouches.

The recent study report by Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham) says that Indian packaging industry is expected to touch the figure of Rs 23,000 crore in the next three years. Agricultural packaging industry business is of worth Rs 5000 crore.

Speaking to Business Standard, on Nichrome's expansion plans, Harish Joshi, managing director, Nichrome India said, “In the last ten years, seed packaging industry has grown a lot. There is a kind of silent revolution in this sector. Due to changes in government policies and research and development, agro-packaging is emerging as a huge market. Earlier, seeds were packed  manually or into loose bags. But now, new industrial methods have been introduced for the packaging. Many multinational companies are in seed packaging business. The production has increased tremendously and automation is must for seed packing.”

"We have a huge base of customers. The company is developing new solutions for packaging industry. We are operating in both vegetables and crop seeds area. Also, we have developed pouch-in -pouch technique to incorporate more seeds in a single pack. While packing the seeds things like content of moisture, percentage of germination and weight have to be taken under consideration,” he said giving details about the techniques used for packaging.