ITL aims to sell one lakh tractors in domestic market

Kolkata, Sep 6 (IANS) International Tractors Ltd (ITL), which sells the country's third largest tractor brand Sonalika, is eyeing to achieve domestic sales of one lakh units in the current financial year, a top company officials said on Wednesday.

"We sold 70,000 units last year and target to sell at least one lakh in the domestic market," company's Senior Vice President (Sales and Marketing) Munish Kumar told reporters here.

According to him, last year, the total domestic sales were around 5.82 lakh units and buoyed by the good monsoon, the industry is expected to touch 6.5 lakh units this year.

"During the April-August period, the domestic sales rose by 11 per cent to 2.57 lakh units as compared with 2.31 lakh units sold in the same period last year," Kumar said.

The company is also looking to export 15,000 units in the current fiscal compared with 12,000-odd exported last year, he said.

In the domestic market, the industry is shifting towards heavy-duty range and the 40-50 HP category is growing rapidly due to different farming activities and applications, he said.

Speaking on Goods and Services Tax (GST), he said: "Pre-GST period, the tax rate was 5 per cent but now it is 12 per cent. As a manufacturer, we are getting input tax credit. We have not increased the prices after the GST as the company has decided to absorb the impact of new tax system. The net impact would be around 2-3 per cent to our cost."

The tractor-maker sold 1,278 units in West Bengal during April-July period, with a market share of 17.2 per cent as against 1,084 units sold last year.

The company invested Rs 800 crore for setting up a new plant at Hoshiarpur in Punjab and along with the older plant, the combined annual capacity is now 3 lakh units, Kumar added.

(This story has not been edited by Social News XYZ staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)