Dileep Sanghani, the incumbent Chairman of IFFCO, has been re-elected unopposed for a second consecutive term, while Balvir Singh has retained his position as Vice Chairman following elections held recently. With the current election, Sanghani becomes the 18th Chairman of the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited.
IFFCO conducted its 15th Representative Governing Body (RGB) elections for its Board of Directors, representing members from over 36,000 cooperative societies at IFFCO Sadan, New Delhi. The extensive electoral process began in March and concluded with the election of 21 Directors on May 9, 2024, at IFFCO’s corporate office in New Delhi.
Notable winners included Jagdeep Singh Nakai, Umesh Tripathi, Prahlad Singh, Balvir Singh, Ramniwas Garwal, Jayeshbhai V Radadiya, Rishiraj Singh Sisodia, Vivek Kolhe, Simachal Padhy, K Srinivasa Gowda, S Shaktikvel, Prem Chandra Munshi, Dr. Varsha L Kasturkar, Dileep Sanghani, Sudhansh Pant, Alok Kumar Singh, J Ganesan, M N Rajendra Kumar, PP Nagi Reddy, Balmiki Tripathi, and Mara Ganga Reddy.
Dr U.S. Awasthi, Managing Director IFFCO, said that the elections were carried out in a fair and transparent manner and congratulated Chairman Dileep Sanghani, Vice Chairman Balvir Singh and all the board members for their valuable contributions to society. He also extended gratitude to all the cooperators and voters for their diligent participation in the election process.
New election system at IFFCO
IFFCO’s election process which ran for more than two months, witnessed the implementation of an innovative election portal, ensuring equitable and transparent participation by all members, regardless of their geographical location.
The new election system at IFFCO marked a significant milestone, eliminating the need for a physical presence in Delhi for form submission or nomination filing. This streamlined approach reflected IFFCO’s commitment to cooperative values of democracy, equality, equity and solidarity and cooperative principles of democratic member control and autonomy and independence.
Expectations ahead
Dileep Sanghani, who started his first term as Chairman of IFFCO in January 2022 following the passing of Balvinder Singh Nakai, brings significant experience from his tenure as a Minister in the Government of Gujarat and a Member of Parliament. He also currently serves as Chairman of NCUI and GUJCOMASOL.
Sanghani’s current term is crucial for IFFCO’s business growth as well as for deepening of cooperative movement in the country.
The Central Government aims to achieve ‘Sahakar Se Samriddhi’ i.e. Prosperity through cooperation by promoting cooperative based economic development model in the country. The Ministry of Cooperation has taken numerous initiatives to transform the Indian cooperative sector.
As a first step, the multi state cooperative society act was amended last year with the aim to make cooperative societies transparent and efficient. Establishment of two lakh new multipurpose PACS, Dairy, Fishery Cooperative societies, formation of Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs), new National Cooperation Policy, National Cooperative Database, formation of three new national level cooperative societies – Bhartiya Beej Sahakari Samiti Limited (BBSSL), National Cooperative Organics Limited (NCOL) and National Cooperative Export Limited (NCEL) are few of the 54 initiatives that the ministry has taken since its formation to revitalize this sector.
Dileep Sanghani has been a member in the new national cooperation policy drafting committee. IFFCO is also a promoter member of NCEL and BBSSL. While NCEL will channelize the export from cooperatives, BBSSL will help increase the production of quality seeds in India. Overall, IFFCO has a major role to play in successfully achieving the objectives of these initiatives by the Government.
IFFCO’s business prospects
Within the organization, Sanghani and Managing Director, Dr. U.S. Awathi have ensured that IFFCO consistently maintains the No. 1 position among the top 300 cooperatives in the world. This ranking is on the basis of ratio of turnover over gross domestic product (GDP) per capita. It signifies IFFCO’s significant contribution in the GDP and economic growth of the country. However maintaining this leadership position is a key challenge.
Moreover, IFFCO has done extraordinary work in taking scientific research to the agriculture fields through ‘Lab to Land’ approach which resulted in liquid Nano Urea and DAP, it has the potential to do more to reduce fertilizer import in the country.
IFFCO’s diverse business initiatives
Since inception, IFFCO has evolved into an ecosystem comprising of products, services and support in areas spanning Fertilizers, General Insurance, Logistics, Kisan SEZ, Rural Retail, Online Multi Commodity Exchange, Organi Agri-Input, Rural Finance, Frozen Foods, Agro Chemicals etc. IFFCO today has business presence in five countries including India.
In recent years, IFFCO has been striving to change the agriculture scenario in the country. Working on the vision of Agriculture 2.0, IFFCO has invested in and has produced path breaking agro technology, including Nanotechnology based fertilizer, promotion of Agri- drones, rural e-commerce, digital enablement of farmers and farms, Internet of Things (IoT) etc.
IFFCO also recently signed an MoU with International Cooperative Alliance (ICA) to hold the ICA Global Cooperative Conference 2024 and General Assembly in Nov, 2024 at New Delhi, alongside the launch of the United Nations International Year of Cooperatives 2025.
