BL Agro To Invest ₹150 Cr To Expand Cattle Breeding Facilities

FMCG firm BL Agro said on Tuesday it would invest ₹150 crore in its biotech unit Leads Genetics to expand cattle breeding facilities, as the country tries to cut its reliance on imported bovine genetics.

The investment will fund a breed improvement farm, an IVF and embryo transfer laboratory, and pathology and genomics laboratories, the company said in a statement. The investment was announced at a two-day summit in Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh.

BL Agro is in talks with Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh to set up similar facilities, it said, without giving a timeline.

India is the world's largest milk producer but yields per animal remain low by global standards, and breeders import semen and embryos for high-yielding genetics.

"This initiative has the potential to significantly contribute to the country's development, improve productivity and enhance farmers' prosperity," Rajendra Shukla, Deputy Chief Minister, Madhya Pradesh, said at the event, "Leads Genetics is helping build genetic self-reliance by producing elite bulls, embryos and sexed semen domestically, while strengthening indigenous breeds," Dharampal Singh, animal husbandry minister for Uttar Pradesh, said.

The company also said it had received its first Zebu-optimised bovine SNP chip, a genotyping tool that screens cattle DNA across thousands of markers to identify animals with higher potential for milk yield, fertility and heat tolerance before conventional performance data is available. The technology follows a cattle-genetics agreement signed between India and Brazil in Brasilia.

Cows bred through the programme are expected to yield an average of 40 to 60 litres of milk a day, BL Agro Chairman Ghanshyam Khandelwal said. That would be several times the Indian average.

Leads Genetics is targeting production of 15,000 embryos a month by the end of 2027, Sarvannan Durairaj, who heads its IVF and embryo transfer division, said.

BL Agro, which sells edible oils and packaged foods under the Bail Kolhu and Nourish brands, also owns agri-technology firm Leads Connect Services.