Tata Chemicals banking on food & nutrition products: Mukundan

The world's second largest soda ash producer Tata Chemicals (TCL) is seeing a huge potential in food and nutrition and aiming to achieve around 60 per cent growth in the segment.
"In September, the turnover of our spice products crossed Rs 100 crore mark. We think that this business will continue to grow at around 60 per cent. We are now present in almost 55,000 stores in India. We are going to continue to focus in the food and nutrition segment," TCL Managing Director R Mukundan told reporters here today.
He was here along with Tata Group Chairman Cyrus Mistry on the occasion of unveiling of a book on TCL - 'Salt of the Earth: Story of Tata Chemicals'.

Gujarat Chief Minister Anandi Patel unveiled the book on the occasion of completion of 75 years of TCL, established in the coastal town of Mithapur in 1939.
Apart from spices, TCL is also banking big on its pulses and salt business. According to Mukundan, the company is working on fulfilling high demand for pulses.
"India will remain a vegetarian nation. Since we don't grow enough pulses, we have to import it in high quantity. Therefore, we have launched 'Grow More Pulses' programme to promote farmers to grow pulses. This scheme first started in Tamil Nadu, followed by Maharashtra, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh," he said.

TCL, which has 57% Indian market share in branded salt segment, is now working on double fortified salt (iron rich salt) to cope with the iron deficiency found in Indian women, Mukundan said.
"We are doing field trials of iron salt or double fortified salt. We believe that 60 per cent women are anaemic, and most don't know about their deficiency. This product will address the issue," he added.
Mistry, who is also the chairman of TCL, said that the company has presence in four continents- Asia, Europe, North America and Africa.