Tractor sales have been on a continuous rise for past several months due to 2 successive years of good monsoon, improved crop production, easy financing options and growing use of tractors in non-agricultural sectors. The government’s focus on roads and highways development as seen in Bharatmala project was also a positive factor for the higher tonnage tractor segment and the players therein. While there continues to exist variations in growth across regions, a majority of the regions have recorded a moderate to healthy growth in volumes, helping the industry volumes touch a new peak on pan India basis in the current fiscal year.
The government’s continued focus on promoting rural development and farmer welfare in the Union Budget continues to favor well for the farm sector. Also the budget lays significant emphasis on the government’s endeavor to double the farmers’ income by FY-2022. The success achieved in implementation of a mechanism to ensure healthy minimum support prices to farmers will remain critical in helping protect the interests of the farmers. Improvement in the rural economy over the medium to long term and successful implementation of the various initiatives is likely to result in sustainable benefits to the farm community. This will surely support tractor’s demand in coming times.
So how did the Tractor OEMs fared over previous 3 Financial Years –
The sector saw an impressive >22% growth and many OEMs also reported their best ever sales figure for a FY! M&M+Swaraj sold over 3 lakh tractors in the domestic market last fiscal, its best ever performance in a financial year. It also held a combined >42% Market Share in the sector and has clear dominance in the Market Share. Also note that OEMs like Escorts, Sonalika & John Deere fared better than Mahindra Group in terms of YoY growth. A better assessment would be the Market Share growth of these Tractor Manufacturers –
While M&M+Swaraj have gained significant YoY growth; it has lost in terms of Market Share. The biggest gainer in FY17-18 was John Deere! It has silently jumped from a Market Share of 6% in FY15-16 to 9% in FY17-18. Other gainers were Escorts & Sonalika who registered a Market Share of 11% & 12% respectively.