Bhupen Dubey, Chief Executive Officer of Advanta Seeds, part of Dubai-based UPL Group, visited Bangladesh for the first time recently to see for himself the agricultural growth that has taken place here over the last couple of decades and held meetings with business stakeholders, including government officials, regulators and seed trade partners.
Bhupen’s time in Advanta Seeds in the capacity of the company’s Global CEO since 2016, saw Advanta emerging as a global leader in tropical and subtropical corn, as well as in forage and grain sorghum, sunflower, canola, rice, and vegetables in many countries. During his brief stay in Dhaka, Bhupen Dubey eked out some time from his busy schedule on Thursday for an exclusive interview with Dhaka Tribune.
Bhupen is well-known in the industry and is a member of several professional organizations. He was a part of the World Economic Forum’s Transformational Leadership and Agricultural Development multi-stakeholder initiative. He is the Chairman of the Asia and Pacific Seed Association’s Special Interest Group (SIG) and a member of the New Vision for Agriculture (NVA) Business Council for India and Asia.
Dhaka Tribune: Advanta Seeds holds a leadership position in tropical and sub-tropical geographies powered by a strong global network. Can you shed light on the current global footprint of the company, its position in the seed market globally, regionally and also in Bangladesh?
Bhupen Dubey: Advanta focuses on innovation, value addition through natural solutions, and disease, pest, and herbicide resistance along with drought and salinity tolerance, while focusing upon bringing a localized need-specific germplasm. By creating seeds that make crops climate smart, salinity - tolerant and drought resilient, we are weatherproofing farm yields and the happiness of farmers especially in tropical and subtropical regions. Advanta is a global leader in sorghum (grain, forage and sweet) and has regional leadership positions in hybrid maize, sunflower, canola, rice, sweet corn, fodder crops and vegetables.
Advanta Seeds is operating in Bangladesh through the legal entity of RiceCo International Bangladesh Ltd and we are the UPL Limited group company. With a 30+ years presence in Bangladesh, Advanta Seeds is actively contributing to the country's food security, economic growth and livelihood improvement of smallholder farmers through innovative technology of high-quality seeds. You will be happy to know that Advanta Seeds is a pioneer in developing and launching the first hybrid maize technology in Bangladesh which resulted in more than doubling the productivity per hectare.
What are the key products you market in Bangladesh and how do you envisage further growth prospects of Advanta Seeds in Bangladesh?
Advanta has strong presence in Bangladesh for field crops seeds especially in:
1) hybrid maize (PAC164, PAC339, PAC139, PAC753, PAC759, PAC741, PAC293)
2) hybrid sunflower (Hysun 33 and Hysun 36)
3) hybrid rice (Golden-1, PetroChem Hybrid dhan-6, Partex dhan-8, BRAC-15 and BRAC-16)
4) fodder crops (Jumbo Gold)
Also, we are present in vegetable seeds market delivering value addition seed varieties –
- virus tolerant hybrid okra for both summer and rainy season
- rainy and heat tolerant hybrid tomato
- tropical and sub-tropical hybrid cauliflower
- rainy and winter season hybrid radish
- both dark and parrot green high pungency hybrid chili
We are having a product development team who are testing new hybrid entries in different climatic zones in Bangladesh.
How Advanta Seeds is positioned in Bangladesh seed industry.
Advanta Seeds hybrid varieties are climate resilient, provide higher yield, disease tolerance and require lower production costs. Advanta Seeds products enable Bangladesh farmers in improving their livelihood and achieve better Return Over Investment (ROI).
What’s Advanta’s relations with leading Bangladeshi seed companies like Lal Teer, Brac, ACI, Supreme Seed etc.
Advanta Seeds is collaborating with country’s leading Seed Companies like BRAC Seeds, ACI Seeds, Lal Teer Seeds, Supreme Seeds, United Seeds, PetroChem, Krishibid Seeds, Metal Seeds, Ispahani Agro who are our valued business partner. We work together for the market development initiatives for reaching our farmers.
You’ve 30 research centres worldwide. Do you plan to open any research and development (R&D) facility in Bangladesh anytime soon?
Advanta Seeds R&D and trialing teams are focusing on developing products suitable for Bangladesh market. Advanta Seeds test new products in varied agro-climatic zones in Bangladesh and Advanta Innovation Centre (AIC) located at Trishal, Mymensingh where currently we are evaluating different new hybrids before moving to farmers field.
Pacific Seeds is a pioneer for introducing the first Maize hybrid in Bangladesh through BRAC Seeds which is our own breeding hybrids and we are continuously investing for the development of market demanded hybrids. Technology Development is the part of the R&D which we have formed here with qualified Agriculture background personnel who are closely working with key stakeholders, business partners and farmers for the evaluating and releasing of superior hybrids suitable for Bangladesh Market.
Definitely we are exploring opportunities for the strengthening R&D facilities in Bangladesh, and we are ready to invest on priorities.
Do you have seed production facilities here in Bangladesh?
Seed Production Research (SPR) is fundamental for exploring opportunities of hybrid seed production commercially. We have made good progress for Seed Production Research on some crop hybrids in Bangladesh which is continuing. We have initiated Hybrid Rice Seed production and are supporting our Business partners for high quality and cost-effective hybrid seed production technologies.
Any additional points you like to emphasize?
India and Bangladesh enjoy very healthy relationships and therefore, Bangladesh farmers will benefit from latest technologies coming out of Advanta seeds, world class research capabilities in India and the rest of the world.
