PepsiCo's biggest Indian unit gets rolling in Andhra Pradesh

PepsiCo will make Andhra Pradesh its national sourcing hub for fruit pulp and other agro products for the Indian market, global chairman and chief executive Indra Nooyi announced on Friday. " PepsiCo wants to make Andhra Pradesh as the national sourcing hub for mango pulp. And in the process, at least 33,000 farmers will be benefited by 2020," said Nooyi.

The announcement comes three months after Nooyi promised Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu— in Davos on the sidelines of World Economic Forum meeting— that the US-headquartered beverages and food products company will procure mangoes in large quantities from the state and look at setting up mango pulp units.

While Nooyi had evinced interest to procure some 250 million tonnes of mangoes from Andhrataken up at around Rs 1,000 crore. Pradesh, Naidu had expressed inability to meet the needs of PepsiCo immediately since the state was producing around 70 million tonnes. However, he promised to step up mango production. The PepsiCo chief also expressed interest in packaging and branding the tender coconut water, a move that could help the coconut farmers in the Konaseema region of the state, apart from procuring jowar, papaya, bananaand other agricultural and horticultural produce. Nooyi and Naidu on Friday inaugurated one of the largest global facilities of PepsiCo at Sri City industrial estate in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh. On the occasion, Naidu inaugurated facilities of 11 global firms involving Rs 1,500 crore of investment and also laid foundation stones for another 11 units being taken up at around Rs1,000 crore.

The first production line took off on Friday at PepsiCo’s facility in Sri City, which is being taken up over 86 acres of land involving an investment of around Rs 1,200 crore consisting of nine production lines that will take off in phases. The company will produce a range of beverages including fruit juice based drinks and carbonated soft drinks, and will add sports and food beverages later. The Sri City facility is the largest beverages plant for PepsiCo in India with single largest investment so far and part of its Rs 33,000 crore committed investment by 2020 in the country.

"For more than 25 years, Pepsi-Co has been investing in Indian economy and its people. As we move forward into our next 25 years, that commitment is stronger than ever," said Nooyi. PepsiCo India CEO D Shivkumar said, "Andhra is one of the richest agro and horticulture bases and also one of the richest consumer bases for us in India."