In his New Year message IFFCO MD Dr U S Awasthi has listed the challenges facing the cooperative behemoth, its achievements over the years and its goals for the future. But most of all, he talks of two things- technology and digital platform. Thanking farmers for displaying their continued trust in IFFCO products he says the secret of staying ahead is to remain abreast of the latest know-how.
We reproduce below his letter on the occasion verbatim-Editor
Dear Friends,
Greetings for the New Year – May it be a Happy and Prosperous one for every one of you!
Before we forge ahead it behooves us to pause for a few moments and reflect over the happenings in the year that was, as well as the year to come. Last year was special for IFFCO. On 3rd November 2016, the company entered the 50th year from date of inception, a new era of Golden Jubilee.
With the advent of the New Year we are moving fast towards the milestone date when this great cooperative will turn 50. A momentous milestone by any standards particularly considering the sheer size of our IFFCO family including our 6000 employees, 36,000 cooperatives& more than 4 Crore farmer members. This is a time to celebrate the triumphs, deliberate over the tribulations, muse over the memories and finally learn from all of it.
A time to take a bow and feel proud of our achievements. It is my honour to share these achievements & other milestones with you.
Our 50Years have not been without fears & struggle for holding our rich values and morals especially; I as your chief executive have encountered numerous challenges & problems in defending our values. In this context I can recall few lines of famous Rashtra Kavi Poet Shri Ramdhari Singh DINKAR :
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Leaders don’t get distracted, Not a moment they lose patience
They just Embrace obstacles and make their way out of Thorns
It has been, and will continue to be, my 
The most important achievement is the sheer trust that the cooperatives and the farmers have reposed on IFFCO and its products. I express my sincere gratitude to you for this and reiterate that IFFCO will continue to live up to this trust and do what it takes to nurture the relationship.
IFFCO has matured into an entity of a size and scale to be reckoned with.
However in these challenging times, maintaining this leadership position is possible only by embracing change, the most significant being technology, even as we preserve our human values.
IFFCO can proudly claim to be an early adapter in the arena of technology. From encouraging the use of bank accounts and emails from way back in 1990s to converting all member cooperatives to doing business online. Today we are doing our all banking transactions online & by just a click, we send the dividends of cooperatives within few seconds to their accounts. We are doing this from the last 3 years. Today we feel proud on the fact that our accounting system is transparent, accurate & technology driven. We prepare our balance sheets within 15 days of closing accounts and all data is available online.
We are proud of our noteworthy achievement of giving dividends of 20% to all our cooperative members from the last 15 years.
At IFFCO, we support the demonetization drive started by the Government and believe that this will certainly have long-term benefits for the farmers at ground level. All technology driven transactions will help in removing middleman & corruption in the system, a hindrance to farmer. With our focus on technology now we are educating farmers and cooperative members on Cashless bank transactions by using mobile banking & knowing the POS machines. We are proudly enriching our farmers to adapt cash less economy by using digital platforms. This is being undertaken through training camps in various locations and will soon cover all 125 locations across the country. Thus we will be an integral part of the Digital India program. Which in turn means that our members can connect to all other benefit schemes by Government also including DBT schemes including fertilizers as well as various savings plans, pension & insurance policies and much, much more.
In the arena of sustainability IFFCO’s ongoing large scale Energy Saving project will soon make its fertilizer plants one of the most Energy efficient ones in the world.
Another offering that is special for our farmers is IFFCO e-Bazaar, the one stop solution for farmers. This has taken service to farmers to the next level. So far nearly 60 bazaar outlets have been set up. By the completion of the 50th year we are targeting it to grow more in three figures.
Yet another successful project has been JIFCO. This plant has grown into one of the largest producers of Phosphoric acid in the world with achieving more than 95% production levels which is unique it itself.
Last but not the least IFFCO is an intrinsic part of the Prime Minister’s Swachch Bharat Abhiyan with its contributions at the village level going all the way from building toilets to clean villages & making use of waste to make manure.
All of this would not have been possible without the trust placed on us by our cooperative members and the millions of farmers we are so closely connected with. I once again express my sincere gratitude to each and every one of you.
Moving ahead it would be prudent for all of us to continue along the path we have already laid out for ourselves with reinforced dedication & renewed energy. This will bring us prosperity with peace. To know more and participate in the same just log onto our website or our social media platforms.
I invite all of you to join us in our celebration of the 50 golden years of IFFCO.
I close with a heartfelt prayer that you and your family have a wonderful year ahead!
Thank you & warm regards.
Dr U.S Awasthi