While rural slowdown was seen impacting growth for the fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies in the June quarter of fiscal 2020, the situation has only become worse in the September quarter that's showing significant stress in the rural markets.
Earlier this week FMCG market leader Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL), which reported domestic consumer growth of 7% on year and underlying volume growth of 5% on year, said that rural growth was 0.5 times that of urban. This basically meant that rural, that was growing at par with urban in the April to June quarter of fiscal 2020, has slowed down further and was now growing at half of urban rate.
According to Sanjiv Mehta, chairman and managing director, HUL, the near term demand outlook, especially in rural India, remains challenging.
A recent Nielsen report, however, makes it very evident that while companies are taking a very conservative view on the rural slowdown, the ground scenario there is way beyond the estimates. In fact, Nielsen did not shy away from making it very clear that 'for the first time in the last seven years, rural growth has dropped below urban'.
Rural is growing at 5% in Q3’19, which is 1/4th as compared to 20% in Q3’18, while Urban is growing at 8% as against 14% growth in Q3’18. The report further said that rural India that contributes 36% to overall FMCG spends has historically been growing around 3-5% points faster than urban. This has been on account of increasing affordability, availability and conversion of commodity to branding resulting in higher demand. However in recent periods, rural growth is slowing down at a much faster rate compared to urban.
The report said, growth in Q3’19 sales per store in rural areas has become 1/4th versus Q3’18, which reflects a significant drop in demand amongst rural consumers. In addition, rural distribution growth has continued to inch downwards. Small manufacturers have seen the biggest drop in cumulative distribution growth where it has moved from 18% in Q3’18 to no growth in Q3’19, while for large manufacturers cumulative distribution growth has halved.
Small players that account for nearly 1/3rd of the sales in rural India through better value for money offerings now grow at a similar rate versus large manufacturers. This is in contrast to Q3'18 which was an inflection point for the growth rates of small and large manufacturers.
The growth rate for small manufacturers has slumped by 23%. Small player exits have increased by 33% and new entrants in the market have fallen owing to strong inflationary pressures and increasing input prices.
There are early signs of the current declining trends getting arrested, according to Sunil Khiani, head – retail measurement service, Nielsen South Asia, as far as outlook for the second half of fiscal 2020 is concerned. "FMCG growth for Q3 2019 stands at 7.6% as against a prediction of 7% to 8% range. This is so far in line with our forecast. With the growth in the e-commerce sector the year end forecast for all India FMCG continues to be in the 9% to 10% range. While we expect Q4 2019 to be in the 6.5% to 7.5% range, we are now finally seeing early signs of the declining trends being arrested. The growth forecast for Q1 2020 (Jan-Mar 2020) stands in the range of 7.5% - 8.5%," Khiani said in the report.
Earlier this week FMCG market leader Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL), which reported domestic consumer growth of 7% on year and underlying volume growth of 5% on year, said that rural growth was 0.5 times that of urban. This basically meant that rural, that was growing at par with urban in the April to June quarter of fiscal 2020, has slowed down further and was now growing at half of urban rate.
According to Sanjiv Mehta, chairman and managing director, HUL, the near term demand outlook, especially in rural India, remains challenging.
A recent Nielsen report, however, makes it very evident that while companies are taking a very conservative view on the rural slowdown, the ground scenario there is way beyond the estimates. In fact, Nielsen did not shy away from making it very clear that 'for the first time in the last seven years, rural growth has dropped below urban'.
Rural is growing at 5% in Q3’19, which is 1/4th as compared to 20% in Q3’18, while Urban is growing at 8% as against 14% growth in Q3’18. The report further said that rural India that contributes 36% to overall FMCG spends has historically been growing around 3-5% points faster than urban. This has been on account of increasing affordability, availability and conversion of commodity to branding resulting in higher demand. However in recent periods, rural growth is slowing down at a much faster rate compared to urban.
The report said, growth in Q3’19 sales per store in rural areas has become 1/4th versus Q3’18, which reflects a significant drop in demand amongst rural consumers. In addition, rural distribution growth has continued to inch downwards. Small manufacturers have seen the biggest drop in cumulative distribution growth where it has moved from 18% in Q3’18 to no growth in Q3’19, while for large manufacturers cumulative distribution growth has halved.
Small players that account for nearly 1/3rd of the sales in rural India through better value for money offerings now grow at a similar rate versus large manufacturers. This is in contrast to Q3'18 which was an inflection point for the growth rates of small and large manufacturers.
The growth rate for small manufacturers has slumped by 23%. Small player exits have increased by 33% and new entrants in the market have fallen owing to strong inflationary pressures and increasing input prices.
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