Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Adani Wilmar Q1 FY 2024 Results Conference Call, hosted by ICICI Securities. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Karan Bhowania from ICICI Securities. Over to you, sir.
Thank you, Sagar. Good afternoon, everyone. It's our pleasure at ICICI Securities to host Adani Wilmar Q1 FY 2024 Results Conference Call. From the management, we have Mr. Angshu Mallick, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director. Mr. Shrikant Kanhere , Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Sahebrao Rawat , Chief Operating Officer. I'll hand over the call to the management for the opening remarks, so that we can open for the Q&A. Over to the management. Thank you.
Okay, thank you very much, and welcome to the Q1 2025 Earnings Call of Adani Wilmar. Thank you very much for joining, taking out the time, and joining this call. As a ritual, we will run through a very crisp presentation to talk about the performance and the financial result of the company, and then we'll open the floor for the question and answers. A quick snapshot on the result summary: the sales volume grew by 13% year-on-year from 1.43 million in Q1 2024 to 1.62 million in Q1 2025 as far as the standalone numbers are concerned. In consolidated, however, the number grew by 12% from 1.49 to 1.66. The growth in volume is also reflective in all the other parameters of the business in terms of revenue, gross profit, and EBITDA impact. All have shown the increase.
Revenue grew by 11% on standalone basis, gross profit by 58%, and EBITDA gone up from INR 122 crore to INR 609 crore on a standalone and INR 619 crore on a consolidated basis. The improvement in EBITDA and the margin profile is, of course, on account of last year's Q1 2024 got impacted because of the hedge misalignment, which was behind us and not now anymore with us. So that's the basic reason why the margin metrics actually have improved as compared to the last year.
This slide gives you a little bit of idea on how the gross margins on normalized basis are moving. I think, and this is what we have been saying for the last couple of calls, that since December 2023, that is Q3 2024 quarter, we are back to our normal run rate of gross profit as well as EBITDA. Gross profit of INR 1,756 crore for June 2024 and the normalized EBITDA of INR 609 crore. This is after taking into account all the normalization impacts which are required, which basically include a derivative impact. Quick update on the company business update: the volume, as I said, grew by 12%.
Revenue at INR 14,169 crore. We could register a highest-ever EBITDA of INR 619 crore for this quarter. The demand environment for the branded and food is steady and is improving. The company is now staying focused on gaining market share, particularly the food and oil brands where we have been able to gain the market share. On ESG front, the company has been included in FTSE4Good Index Series, and of course, all the ESG efforts on ESG performance continue for the company. Particularly on edible oils, we recorded a 12% improvement year-on-year in terms of volume.
The revenue now is to that INR 10,649 crore in Q1, up 8% from last year. We have seen a strong growth in sunflower and mustard oil both. Both oils have been able to showcase a very good growth in year-on-year terms. As far as the mustard is concerned, we are also trying our product range in the premium category. We have launched one product called Pehli Dhaar , which is a cold press, which is a first-press wood-press mustard oil. We are continuing our efforts to launch more and more premium oils in and around food as well as edible oil. We have been able to achieve the highest-ever profits in edible oil in Q1 2025. The segment profit for Q1 2025 now is to that, this time is to that INR 398 crore.
This is also on the back of stability in the edible oil prices that we have seen in this last gone-by quarter, which is Q1. The movement in edible oil prices were rangebound between $100-$150, not more than that. This has also helped us, particularly for the companies who have got a brand in front. The food and FMCG highlights revenue grew by 40%. This includes the government-to-government business also, which we did in Q1, and revenue now is to that INR 1,500+ crore. So by this run rate, the food business ideally should close the year FY 2025 by close to INR 6,000 crore, which was INR 5,000 crore last year. The branded food is scaling up consistently for the last, I know, more than 11 quarters. The food is growing at 30% year-on-year.
Wheat flour business continues its growth trajectory by gaining market share and by growing on a year-on-year basis. Rice business stays steady. We are leveraging our edible oil network to see that our food product keeps growing at a 30%+ kind of year-on-year growth. So this is a trajectory which we are trying to showcase, particularly in edible oil. If you can look at Q1 2022, we were close to 660,000 tons of oil to now 1,000,000 tons of oil in Q1 2025, which puts up CAGR of 15% on edible oil.
The standalone EBITDA has grown up from INR 118 crore now to INR 604 crore, which is quite significant. Market share we are consistently improving in spite of being a strong number one. We are steadily consolidating our market share from 18.4% in June 2023 to now close to 19% in June 2024. The capacity utilizations are at a reasonably good level, 63%, suggesting that we have enough capacities in place as we speak today to accommodate any kind of growth that we may get in coming quarters.
The growth trajectory of the food and FMCG business also is very impressive, just like edible oil. From Q1 2022, when we were at close to 120,000 tons for a quarter to now plus of 300,000 tons, is growing at a 38% CAGR. Revenue is growing at 44% CAGR from INR 520 crore in Q1 2022 to now close to INR 1,500 crore in Q1 2025. So the quarterly trend looks very good. The market share is also consistently improving in wheat flour from 5% in June 2023 to now 5.9% in June 2024, steadily growing close to 100 basis points of growth.
Basmati rice consumer pack market share is more or less flattish, but we have been able to maintain our number three position in this particular segment. If we look at a segment-wise profitability for the Q1, the standalone EBITDA is now INR 669 crore, of which INR 604 crore came from edible oil. Food and FMCG INR 31 crore, where we are still spending whatever we are making at a gross margin level, we are spending on distribution and various other schemes to continue the growth rate that we are getting in the food. Industry essentials at INR 48 crore, an unallocable expense of INR 14 crore. So that's how the segment results stack up, which is quite healthy as compared to the same period last year. A quick update on our general trade distribution.
Now our reach to the trade, including the direct as well as indirect, is close to 2.1 million outlets. Of that 2.1 million outlets, 740,000 outlets we are reaching directly, so that is 18% year-on-year growth. Rural town coverage is consistently growing. We are now covering close to 30,000 towns in rural towns. Our target, of course, remains the same that we want to cover close to 50,000 towns by March 2025. The alternate channels besides the general trade are also growing very fast for us. The alternate channels clock the revenue of close to INR 759 crore in Q1 2025. That is 15% year-on-year growth. E-commerce and quick commerce continues to grow faster than the general trade. The Horeca, which is the channel which we are developing for the last two years, is also showing very encouraging results for us.
The Horeca revenue crossed INR 150+ crore in Q1 2025 and INR 500+ crore in the last 12 months' basis. We have added seven new towns now during the quarter, taking the total coverage of the Horeca channel now to close to 48 towns. We also further plan to expand this coverage of Horeca channel to 100+ large towns in the near future. The branded export, which is also a focus area of the company for the last couple of years now, we are exporting to over 30 countries now. The food business contributed 44% of branded export, and therefore it's growing at a rate of 36% year-on-year. These are the couple of BTL consumer engagements the company did. I'll not spend much time on them.
But the message of the slides is that we are consistently spending on distribution, BTL, and advertisement to take the brand to every category of the customer. These are some of the branding which we did for the metro rail and so that the reach to the consumer is more effective. So in short, the final takeaways for Q1 2025, if I have to summarize them all, is that there is a volume growth of 12% year-on-year. The edible oil volumes have crossed 1,000,000 tons now for the quarter. The food FMCG revenues to that INR 1,500 crore. In particular, in edible oil, it grew by 12% with very significant growth that we have seen in sunflower and mustard, particularly. Food and FMCG volumes grew by 42%, and the revenue also grew plus of 30%.
Distribution reach has now 18% year-on-year to reach at 740,000 direct outlets. Rural town coverage at 30,000. The alternate channel, which is also a focus area, is growing very fast. ESG efforts of the company continue, and this is a result of that, that we have been included in FTSE4Good Index Series recently. This is it from my side as far as the presentation is concerned. I just briefly talked about the numbers. I hope the audience who have joined the call have consumed the numbers and performance which we have declared yesterday. Now, therefore, I would ask the moderator to open the floor for question and answer.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone phone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Abneesh Roy from Nuvama. Please go ahead.
Yeah, congrats on a very good set of profits. My first question is on the EBITDA margin. I wanted to understand, is there any one-off here? 4%+ EBITDA margin, and FY 2024, I understand, was very tough because of sharp inflation followed by sharp deflation, and then a lot of inventory impact losses were there. So are there any learnings? Have you changed your hedging policy in any way, your inventory overall? Any change there which has led to some incremental profits here? So if you assume this kind of a pricing in terms of the edible oil, would you expect 4%+ margins to sustain if nothing changes? I understand this is a real world, and the geopolitical issue can always keep changing. But any one-offs here and any comments if you can give?
So Abneesh, just to answer your question straight, there is no one-off in the numbers which have been declared. So it's a normal business profit, number one. Number two, of course, last year has rightly put in by you. The last year numbers got impacted because of hedge misalignment, which we experienced. Not only we, but actually the entire industry experienced that. Number three, of course, when the prices are stable and the demand is good, usually the brand business does well, and that's what happened to us.
And therefore, the numbers are quite encouraging for us in this quarter. And therefore, as we go forward, we are hopeful that no such geopolitical issues will come up, and the supply chain of the commodity and price levels would more or less remain in range. I think we should be able to continue this run rate in coming quarters as well.
Sure. My second question is on some of the competitive intensity from new players. So if I see Amul, they are advertising a lot on the print media and out of home, also in Mumbai at least, in terms of their organic products. So two questions here. Would you also have a thought process on India's specific organic products? Because a lot of organic products are available, which are of suspect quality also. Of course, Amul would address that part. And second is, Amul's pricing, of course, would be premium given it's organic. But what will be the impact on your business if you could tell us that from a longer-term perspective?
Okay. Abneesh, the first one is on the print ad and their spends, BTL and all that. Every company has a budget with which it has to manage its ATL and BTL. We are also reasonably okay in print, and we also have almost annual plans with the Times of India and others. So print-wise, whatever the commodity business or the staples business can afford, we are there. And we are the largest vendors of edible oil, for sure. So there we have both social media, television, and all that. Second, it comes to organic products. See, organic one is the scale. Most important is that a company like ours would always like a supply chain which can provide us with the quantity that we need when we grow the business.
Unless we have a backward integration, we won't be able to succeed. Now, honestly, to get into this organic, first, it required three to four years of work without using that organic product as organic because it needs three crop seasons to get into the purity form. Without that, we won't get a certificate. That is one. Two, we need farmers, and then we have to have complete backend with contract farming and all that, which is a very big operation. Amul has the strength. They have a farmers' organization, and hence they have that source or the supply side secured, and that is their strength.
So since that is their strength, they are playing with their strength. I don't think companies like us can do anything big in organic unless we get into big-time contract farming and then have patience for three years minimum growing crop and managing that. So as of now, the other side of the business is very big for us. We are already in the staples which can grow fast, and you are seeing we are growing at 30%-40% per annum year-on-year. So we have great scope to do that. So basic staples, we are more interested because there the scope is anytime high. Organic and all these are very small niche markets of the entire bigger pie.
Sure. My next question will be on the opening remarks on premiumization. So here, if you could tell us specific in premium edible oil, there is one large player, and then another player got sold off by the US parent to a private equity. So if you could tell us how is your participation? Are you happy with the performance of the last two, three years in that part of demand? I understand it's very small versus your scale, but ultimately, if that is the premiumization, that is where the market growth will be faster. So can you discuss that part? How big is it?
P resently, only one company has a substantial share in the blended oil premium category. Rest of the brands are very small or niche and not available throughout the country. Now, we have functional oil put under the category Xpert. So the Xpert range we have brought, which handles only the Xpert as an Xpert, it handles right. Well, functional oil, we have Sugar Conscious, Immunity Booster, and the third one is the Total Balance.
Apart from that, we have just started one cold press, Pehli Dar, first press, what we call it, not the cold press because all kachi ghani can be cold pressed, but the first press is only the softer part of the mustard seed is crushed first, and the oil is taken out, and then it is bottled. This oil has high aroma, high pungency, and is much better in taste. It's like the extra virgin olive oil, but it is even better than that. So that we have just introduced a month or two months back, and the initial responses are good. This will be a value-added premium product. Apart from that, the Xpert range, and in the Xpert range, we will add Xpert low-GI white rice, low-GI basmati rice, and low-GI atta.
And all this will be under the Xpert range, which will be with people who have sugar problem or any other. But let me tell you, more than consumer-side premium, we are working on the B2B business and trying to make that premiumization. One is that in maida, we have flour mills where we can make now flour, especially for the bun, for the cream rolls, for the croissant, for pizza. We are now doing for noodles, especially. Now, these are special flours which are used for special application, and they fetch a premium because of the consistency and quality. So we are looking at both consumer in-home as well as out-of-home B2B consumers.
Understood. Just one follow-up I had on the edible oil. So in palm oil, sir, we are seeing one disruption by the market leader in soaps. They have cut their palm oil by 25% in two of their brands. How does this impact your business from a raw material side and possibly in some of the byproducts you sell to the soap players? How does this impact from longer term? I understand these are very early days, but given its market leader and the confidence they have shown on this, can this impact both supply side and your demand side, raw material side and your consumer side?
I don't think we are in that arena of supply chain. Whatever CPO we import, we make our palm oil, and then the PFAD that we have goes for our oleochemical business. Yes, we do sell soap noodles to most of the big toilet soap manufacturers because we are one of the largest soap noodle manufacturers in the country. We do supply glycerin and stearic acid also as oleochemical products. But I don't think that will impact the palm oil business, anybody here. And overall, the share of palm oil in the soap is not so significant, honestly. So that is not going to impact anybody for that matter, either Malaysia or the Indonesian players or even in India, anybody.
Understood. Thanks a lot, sir. That's all from my side. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Harit Kapoor from Investec. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good afternoon. Congrats on good numbers. I just had two or three questions. One is on the food and efficiency side. So while I understand that the government orders would be coming at a lower margin, but I just wanted to get a sense of why we have seen a year-on-year reduction in the profits on this side, especially because the scale has been good, even in the non-government order businesses grown at 19%-20%. So if you could just give a sense of particularly in this quarter, because what's really happened, that would be helpful.
Harit, sorry, your voice was actually breaking. So can you just spell out your question again?
Yes. Can you hear me now? Is this better?
Yeah.
Yeah. So what I was trying to ask was that the profit margins in the food and efficiency business have been a tad lower this time. I understand one reason is that there is a government order business, but even on an absolute basis, the profit numbers have been a bit lower. So what would you be attributing that to? Is it a commodity impact? Is it higher investments in promotion and distribution? I just help me understand that.
Yeah. Okay. So got your question very clearly now. So Harit, I think the profitability, and this is what we have been saying for quite a couple of quarters, that we are investing now more and more in distribution and advertisement and other infra. So to ensure that the kind of growth with food and FMCG has been showing continues, and we get to a very reasonably good level of food and FMCG basket, which currently, I think this year, we should close at 1.25 million tons of basket.
That's the reason why the food and FMCG margins are like this, plus and minus. I mean, there's not a significant movement in margin, but I think by design is that we are keeping we are basically investing whatever we are earning at a gross margin level into the infrastructure for distribution as well as on other heads.
Got it. Got it. The second part, again, on food and FMCG was if you could just give us a sense of what the nature of this kind of government order is and if it is likely to persist going forward as well in a similar kind of quantum.
You see, you are aware that government has banned exports of white rice and broken rice. Now, what government has done is that if they receive any orders from friendly government countries, they approve export, but that we can't do directly. We have to route it through the cooperative companies in India, which are KRIBHCO, or you can say NCEL, or even NAFED to some extent.
These are the companies through whom we have to build, and they will build to the counterpart in that country, and that is how it will be exported. Government to government means from here, any of the cooperative firms nominated by central government can be the exporter. We can't be the direct exporter. Our job is to procure the rice from the market and process and pack and send it to the port at FOB level. After that, we have to sell it to NAFED or anybody, and NAFED will be the exporter. This is the G2G business.
Small margin, but good volume, and it helps you in overall rice business because if you are a normal exporter also, then it helps you. So that is why we are doing. And I can't say it will last for long because these are all government orders. Tomorrow, if the white rice is open the way it was earlier, then the G2G business may not happen, or it may continue if the duty is still imposed, and the government to government business doesn't have a duty, then possibly this business will continue. So going forward, can't say much about it. As of now, if there is a business, we are not losing that opportunity because it helps us in utilizing our same manpower, logistics support, port operations, everything remaining same. So it gives us margin.
Got it. Got it. No, makes sense. Makes sense. The other part is in food and efficiency. So again, if you look at the trend of shares in wheat flour versus basmati rice, over the last three quarters, you've seen wheat flour shares actually move up fairly significantly, almost 50 basis points over a three-quarter period. Rice has been fairly stable. I just wanted to understand the competitive dynamics between these two segments and what's kind of allowing you to win faster in wheat flour versus rice currently. While obviously on a YY basis, you're doing extremely well on the shares, I just wanted to understand last three quarters, what are the different dynamics playing out here between the two segments?
Very good. Very good observation. On wheat flour, let me tell you, there is one big competitor having 40%-45% market share, and then we are the second largest at 5.9%. Then below us, there may be 10 brands, 2%-3%. That means this entire market is very fragmented with only one player. So to garner share from these small, small players is relatively easier. Relatively easier. 1. 2, our distribution in south and strategy in south, marketing strategy, all this has clicked well.
And that is why our south market share has gone up to 7.5%-8%. But if you see Chennai, we are almost 18%-19% in Chennai city. That is because we did some marketing activity, which clicked, and the demand went up very, very fast. So that is the reason why you see atta we have done so well. Now, let's go to basmati rice. Basmati rice historically has two players who are there in the market for more than 25 years.
Now, they both have around 35% and 30%, 60%-65% market share, and they are quite a strong player, and they manage that. Rest of the brands, there isn't any. We are at 8% or something. Rest below us, there may be small, small players or very, very fragmented share or private label also possible. Now, here, the large two brands are strong in their work, and 60%-65% they are holding very, very clearly. Here's the gap to garner from 10% - 15% will be relatively little tough, but yes, we have done some reworking. Like last year, we pushed Kohinoor, and the Kohinoor market share has gone up, but I think more of distribution we have to do, and we are working on it. Our Gohana plant will be ready by November.
That will be the first IPO project plant where we are putting almost 600 tons per day paddy to rice line and 500 tons per day rice to rice line. It will be one of the largest food parks in the country, having integrated operations of mustard oil, rice bran oil, cottonseed oil. Then I have maida there, wheat flour, rice, everything. So this plant will be big. So we are waiting for that. Once that happens, the quality of the product, the performance, yield, everything will be much better, and we will have big supply chain support. Once you have a big supply chain support in commodity business, brand and that part will help us in pushing. I'm confident that this market share will increase to 10%-12% in another three to four quarters.
Thank you so much for this. I had just one last thing on the distribution side. You obviously mentioned about the rural town coverage. I just wanted to understand what are the similar March 2025 targets for direct reach? And the second question on that was how much of our current direct reach is also being used for food and FMCG already? I mean, obviously, the 7.4 lakh outlets would all be I mean, they will all be reaching across that, but how much would food and FMCG also have reached by now in that 7.4 lakh?
Okay. See, today, as of June, our direct reach means a salesman going and booking order from an outlet, and we capturing that data was at 7.4 lakh. Out of which, almost 3.5 lakh was rural, and rest 4 lakhs almost was urban. Now, we are doing now roughly 30,000. Q1, the rural coverage, we couldn't expand much because of the election and heat wave. But our target, exit target, March 2025 is 50,000 target. And we are hopeful of reaching very near to those figures because the Q1 we lost, honestly.
So we have three quarters to go, and we have to reach 50,000. That is one. So we are working on that. Second is this 50,000 would almost represent 70% of the potential rural town and the business. So we will have much bigger strength of rural distribution. Third, you said that how many outlets are there? See, when I say oil outlet, it did not mean that they buy all the oil. If you go to south, they may not buy soybean or mustard, but they are buying sunflower.
Now, in the east, it is mustard. Oil-wise, if you see, mustard has the highest penetration among any oil in the country for both us as well as for Nielsen. Also says that mustard has the highest penetration. So we have almost direct reach of roughly 3 lakh outlets out of 7.5 lakh in mustard. Sunflower, soybean has around 2.5 lakh outlets. Atta is around 2 lakh, 25,000 outlets.
Like this, there will be different number of outlets, but on the whole, one or the other product is covered and is purchased by 7.4 lakh regional outlets. On the 7.4 lakh, is there a target on where you'll take it? Unique food can be as high as 3 lakh outlets, but not that everybody is keeping all the product. Some people may not keep besan. Some towns in Maharashtra, UP, I have seen, they keep besan, nuggets, may not keep rice. Like this, you will get. So about 3.5 lakh retail outlets keep food. Total 7.5 lakh outlets we are covering, and every outlet will buy some of the products we sell in their area.
Understood. Understood. Thank you so much. I'll come back to that. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Ayaan Kartik from Outlook Business. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. I just wanted you to throw some light on the kind of competition you have seen from regional and local players because in the last one, we have seen a lot of brands reporting competition from local players. I just wanted to understand what has been the effect on Adani Wilmar in Q1 and what kind of trends you are looking to see. Thank you.
See, on oil, I will tell you, when the oil prices were high, say last to last year, local players were really doing well because the inflation and the prices were much higher. So brands like us would have costed them INR 25 per liter more. Today, when the edible oil prices are stable, brands like us have much more strength because in terms of pricing power, in terms of purchase power, supply chain distribution, so our sales of Fortune has increased, number one.
So competition for us is less in refined oils, more will be in mustard oil because that is a domestic oil, and it is processed in many parts of the country. But we still are the clear leader by around 15%. We have a margin, and the next brand is around 6%. But it's a very fragmented market, mustard oil. When it comes to food, this business is dominated by regional players. National player, say in atta, there is only one technically. In dal, there isn't any national brand.
Basmati, also there isn't any great national brand. three to four good regional brands are there. So in food, we have to fight with the regional brand. And our fight with the regional brand is always on quality, consistency, price, value for money, distribution, reach, and brand. And second, our distribution in e-commerce and modern trade. So there, we continue to fight with the local players and getting the shares, and we will have to fight with the local players because there isn't any national player.
All right. Yeah. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rohan Patel from Turtle Capital. Please go ahead.
Hello. Am I audible? Yes. As of financial year 2024, we did sales in rice. I'm talking about rice.
Mr. Patel, you are sounding a lot muffled. If you're using the speakerphone, please try to use the handset mode, please.
Am I audible right now?
Your voice is very low right now, sir.
Is it now audible?
This is much better, sir. Yes, please go ahead.
Okay. Yeah. So I just wanted clarity. As of financial year 2024, I'm talking about rice. We did somewhere around 50,000 metric tons, right?
No, 50,000 metric tons you are saying for what? Overall rice?
Yeah, overall, overall.
No, no, no. 50,000. In FY 2024, we did much more than 50,000 tons.
Yeah. Would you share what the quantum?
This quantum as such is not available in the public domain as such, but we can give you an idea of what volume of rice we did in FY 2024. A little higher than 200,000 tons.
Okay. And out of that, how much would be the branded part and non-branded part?
The branded part would be around 40%-50%. And private label exports are there, which are their brands, which we export. So that is also there. So altogether, brand-brand for us, more than 50%; 30%-40% would be around private label, depending on which country like Saudi and other places private label goes. And rest is local B2B.
Okay. So roughly in the range of 50%, I can consider it as branded.
More than 50% will be branded.
Okay. At the export percentage, like out of the 200 + 1,000 we have done, what would be the export as a percentage?
25% export. 25% export, 75% domestic.
Domestic. And if you can help me out, do you do arbitrage ?
We do arbitrage , but small quantity.
Small quantity. Top four to five export destination?
Export destination would be Australia, Saudi, UAE.
Okay. And are you looking into growing your own brand, or you want to also grow the private label in private label also? Because in Saudi, one of our competitors isn't present, which used to be present over there. So are you leveraging on that opportunity also to increase your quantum?
The competitor of the one you are referring to, they have done some work, and they have got some investments from Saudi and possibly having a tie-up for distribution. But for us, we are doing 3P, but we are also working through our Wilmar and JV partners, those who are interested like in the U.S., Australia, other places. So we prefer to export in our brand Fortune.
Okay. Okay. I get that. Can you share some rough idea about what EBITDA margins our Rice division would be making?
That will be. See, right now, I think what we have been saying for the last couple of quarters, most of our food is basically an EBITDA neutral, and that is basically by design because we are spending more on distribution and other infrastructure.
Okay. And if you can just share.
Mr. Patel, may we request you return to the question queue for follow-up?
Just last question. Just last question.
One other participant is waiting for their turn.
Okay. Okay. Just for understanding, if I can ask one last question. So what are you targeting for FY 2025 with the volumes in Rice?
We will be targeting much more volume. We are just waiting for our Gohana plant to get ready and commission. That commissioning, once it happens, we will have in-house supply chain. So I can tell you one thing that we are looking at 30%-40% growth year-on-year for the next three years.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much.
Thank you. A reminder to all the participants. If you wish to register for questions, you may press star and one. The next question is from the line of Karan Bhowania from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead, sir.
Thank you for the opportunity. First of all, congratulations on a good set of numbers. So I have two questions. Firstly, you had highlighted that sunflower oil has done good in this quarter, right? And I do remember that sunflower oil, if I look at market leadership, you are market leaders in other oils, but in sunflower, you're a third player. So can you highlight the initiatives you've taken for driving this growth, and what is the market share gain in this particular segment?
Okay. See, one is that sunflower oil surely is part of our focus area. It is an oil which always gives consistent good margin. Now, as far as oil is concerned, we have enhanced our processing capacity, and we are possibly one of the second-largest importers in the country of sunflower oil. And we have almost the largest processing capacities across the country. Now, as far as sunflower oil is concerned, south and west accounts for 85% of the market. And in this market, south, we were weak. So we made some strategies, and we did some work on it. And slowly and steadily, year-on-year, we have seen the results come in, and our south market share has gone up.
Accordingly, our sunflower oil market share, if I'm not wrong, has gone up from around 10.1%- 11.3%. So we have gone up by 1.2%. And I don't think there is any other brand in the country who has shown any growth in the Q1. So we are the only people who have grown. That is because we did some work on it. We are hopefully number two now, if I'm not wrong, because I have not seen the last figure, but we were number three earlier, behind Gold Winner. But now I think we are number two.
Got it, sir. Very helpful. The thing is, just wanted to understand, you have been historically slightly weaker in the southern market, right? And now you're gaining market share in the wheat segment, sorry, in the wheat category in the south market. So just wanted to understand how are the synergies working in terms of distribution between the edible oil and food segments for the southern market?
See, I have always said earlier also when people used to ask me, or analysts did ask me that, "How are you going to win south?" And I had always said that what is our strength is that we have a basket of product. We are not only in oil. We are the oil, rice, flour. We are three big things. Now, we will play with all the three things together, and we will win because we have an offering to the retailer. And that exactly we did that.
We went to the sunflower oil retailer, gave them atta at an offer which they couldn't reject, and they took. And slowly, the market started accepting the atta. And now Atta sales, say, in Chennai city is almost equal to sunflower oil sales. So that is how we have started doing well. And going forward, to win south, we will have to win by our strength, which is our portfolio of product.
Got it. So that is very helpful. Lastly, also, rural versus most of the FMCG companies have been highlighting that they are seeing green shoot in the rural markets, and rural have outperformed the urban for the last couple of quarters. If you could highlight something, how do you see the demand for your products in rural versus urban?
See, rural has been under pressure. All the FMCG players have been mentioning this. Our staples business, obviously, the first choice for any consumer has to be staples and then any other product. So we did not get impacted, but we did not grow also. Our share, 29%-30% remained at that level. So rural contributed only 30%, which we felt should have been more.
Now, going forward, we see some positive lights, mainly because, one, the monsoon is likely to be good, and we are all seeing that happen. Two is that the government's initiative in investing more in the rural area for schemes and all that. And if this brings more employment, more rural productivity, and all that, I'm sure rural consumption will grow. As staples business, consumers prefer first to buy their sugar, wheat, atta, rice, and then any other products. So I'm sure that we will see a good growth. Going forward, I think October onwards, the rural market should do better.
Got it. So that's very helpful. I'll come back on the queue and answer the questions. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Deepak Mohan from Aviva Investors. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Am I audible?
Yes.
Congratulations for great set of numbers. I just have one query. Basically, can you just give me an overview of how your industrial essentials business is doing? Because none of your PPT presentation covers that. So what is the because I can see that the value mix as well as the volume mix is growing there. So can you just give me a fair idea about industrial essentials business?
Okay. See, in industrial essentials, we have three main products. First is oleochemicals. Second is castor oil and derivatives. And third is our meal, which we use for cattle feed or animal feed, which is mainly soya DOC or DOC, mustard DOC, and rice bran DOC. Now, you take oleochemical business. Oleochemical business has been doing very well for us. We have the largest oleochemical complex in the country. We are 25% producers of glycerin in the country and almost 32% stearic acid.
We make almost 10% soap noodles in the country. After you take away the in-house consumption of Unilever's and Godrej, if you take that out, which is 600,000 tons, out of 400,000 tons, we make almost 100,000 tons soap noodles. So we are reasonably strong in oleochemical player. We have recently acquired one company called Omkar. Omkar is the company's name that we have. They have downstream specialty chemical products, and we have good business understanding about it. So we thought we need some partner to grow this business. This is a profitable business, and we are working on it to grow this business. So that is specialty chemicals. Second comes castor.
We are the world's largest exporters of castor and processors. That business has been doing well. We are getting into derivatives because that is value addition. Next, new CapEx on derivatives is going on. Castor, we will grow this business and make it much more profitable. The third one is your DOC. What has happened is the summer, the DOC business was less, and that is why you see that the volume growth is not there. It is only because of the rapeseed meal. We couldn't export what we had targeted. This quarter possibly that will be covered because it goes on rollover for the next month or so.
We should follow up. Yes, sorry.
Yes, please.
Just as a follow-up, I wanted to ask that, are we also looking in terms of export for the specialty chemical business, or is it just for the domestic production only?
Presently, we do export our stearic acid, glycerin, even soap noodles, and brand. We do export. Going forward, specialty chemicals will be. It is application-based. Suppose any product which is required, and we have a country where we can sell, we will surely explore. Wilmar is also big in oleochemical business, so they also have clients outside their area of operation like China and Malaysia, Indonesia. So they also have in Europe. So we can also export there. So export will be our area of operation as we go around.
And just a last question. You have said that you are—
Sorry, Deepak, I'm just coming in between just to give you a better idea on because you had asked that whether this business is growing, yes or no. I think, see, out of the three components which Mr. Mallick mentioned, castor, oleo, and the oil mill, castor and oleo both are growing in double digits. So castor grew by close to 10%, and oleochemical grew by 13% year-on-year in this quarter. But there was a degrowth of oil mill business of 22%, and that's where the entire category degrew by 7%. Having said that, the oil mill business is, of course, depending upon the parity and the market conditions. So that's not something which is a very sustainable business. But castor and oleo are the main segments of this Industry Essentials segment which are growing in double digit.
I believe we are a bit positive on both those segments.
Yes, very much.
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question we will take from an email which we have received from one Mr. Mitesh Kumar. He has a specific set of questions, particularly on the Bangladesh operations. Therein his first question was that, "Why the Bangladesh unit is under the loss since many quarters, though the India business has recovered back?" See, Bangladesh has got a different problem. First of all, we actually faced a problem on the currency front last full year. Besides that, I mean, Bangladesh also faced macro headwinds the way other economies are also facing in terms of inflation and interest rates.
So the government was trying to put in price control in the country, and therefore price control coupled with the currency problem had some issues which we had last year, and therefore we suffered losses in Bangladesh last year. However, after the elections in Bangladesh recently, the new government is in place, and the things are now improving. So for this quarter, we had a loss of close to INR 10 crore, which is far, far less than what we had in the same quarter last year. So that has been now taken care of. Things are improving from here. Currency situation has already been improved there. So the availability of dollars in the country is no more an issue. We still have some issue around the parity, which is getting resolved.
So as we go forward in the quarter 2 and quarter 3, I think you will see the improvement in the Bangladesh operations. The second question was, "When likely Bangladesh unit will recover from profit?" I think I answered in the first question itself. The third question is not related to Bangladesh, but it is on the OFS, which is that, "Is there any plan for an OFS for AWL?"
So I think we have mandatorily have to see that the minimum public shareholding is achieved by FY 2025, given the fact that we got listed in FY 2022. So we otherwise have to do that. Now, OFS is one part of it, so I can't comment whether it is going to be OFS or any other method. There are specific methods listed by the SEBI, which can be used by the promoters to achieve the MPS.
But I can only confirm on this call that, yes, the efforts are on to achieve that MPS of 25%, for which the 13% dilution by the promoter would be on the cards from today till Feb '25. But whether it will be OFS, I can't right now comment on that. The last question was, "Future guidance of AWL revenue and profit growth, given the oil seed prices in international market and other regime options." I think the prices is what we have been saying. The prices have been stabilized. We saw Q1 numbers quite healthy, given the fact that there was no much volatility in the prices.
So we are hopeful that this scenario will continue along with the stability in prices, and demand will also continue, given the fact that in H2, there will be a lot of festivities in India, and demand will be more than what we have experienced in the quarter one. So this performance we can expect. But having said that, business is always a business. You can't foresee some of the hidden risk, but that will always be there. So we are hopeful. I think we should continue with the current performance as we go forward. So this is what we had on the email. I think I'll hand it over again to moderator if there are any other participants in the queue to ask any question they can open.
Right. Well, sir, there are no further questions. I would like to hand the conference over to the management for closing comments.
Yeah. On behalf of Adani Wilmar, we are thankful for attending this call, and we encourage all the participants to participate in our call and hear our story and performance. Thank you very much.
Thank you all. We hope we have a good festive season starting this month, followed by a big wedding season coming from November. We hope the monsoon is going to be good. Overall, overall, the atmosphere remains positive, and consumption looks to be solid. I think all the FMCG companies, including us, should do well in the next three, four quarters. Thank you all.
Thank you.
[Foreign language]
On behalf of ICICI Securities, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines.