Dodla Dairy Ltd (NSE: DODLA) Q3 2026 Earnings Call dated Jan. 28, 2026
Corporate Participants:
Dodla Sunil Reddy — Managing Director
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy — Chief Executive Officer
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla — Chief Financial Officer
Analysts:
Sanjay Manyal — Analyst
Aditya Khandelwal — Analyst
Aniruddha Joshi — Analyst
Resham Jain — Analyst
Abhishek Mathur — Analyst
Praveen Kumar — Analyst
Deepak Lalwani — Analyst
Sidharth Negandhi — Analyst
Resha Mehta — Analyst
Ankit Shah — Analyst
Vandana Rathi — Analyst
Presentation:
operator
Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Dodla Dairy Ltd. Q3FY26 earnings conference call. This conference call may contain forward looking statements about the company which are based on the beliefs, opinions and expectations of the company as on the date of this call. These statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve risks and uncertainties that are difficult to predict. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen only mode and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing Star then zero on your touchstone telephone.
Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Dodla Sunil Reddy, Managing Director. Thank you. And over to you sir.
Dodla Sunil Reddy — Managing Director
Thank you very much. Good morning to all the participants. On behalf of Gurla Dairy Ltd. I extend a warm welcome to everyone joining us on our call today. On this call I’m joined by our CEO Mr. BVK Reddy, our CFO Mr. Mudimohan Raju and SGA our Investor Relations Advisor. I hope that everyone had an opportunity to go through the financial results and investor presentation which have been uploaded on the stock exchange and our company website. During the quarter we continue to maintain our revenue growth momentum and register a top line of 10,025 crores with a year on year growth of 13.75% backed by strong volumes.
This quarter performance reflects steady execution across our core business despite a challenging operating environment marked by weather related impact on product mix and elevated procurement cost. In this backdrop we record an EBITDA margin of 7.7% and a PAT margin of 6.7%. On the volume side we saw an increase in the volumes from milk sales, curd sales as well as VAP products on a year on year basis. The increase reflects our volume growth in Dhordla products aided by the inclusion of OSAM’s full quarter performance and robust growth in the African business. However, bulk sales of SMP and butter dropped in negligible levels in Q3FY26 as compared to 72 crores in the same period last year.
This indicates that the entire growth was driven by liquid milk and product sales. Additional value added products like ghee, lassi, buttermilk and ice cream etc. Which carry higher margins had a lower sales contribution during the quarter on a sequential basis due to the onset of earlier winters and severe winters on a year to year basis. These products continue to deliver healthy growth. Typically, our procurement costs come down with the arrival of the flush season. However, the trend was reversed this time around and we saw about a 2.5 rupees per liter sequential increase in procurement cost.
This was primarily due to an industry wide shortage of milk supply caused by erratic rainfall last year. This increase in price was even higher in regions where we have stronger presence. For instance, Maharashtra increased to about 10% and in the other four states it was around 6 to 7%. The increase in cost was not fully passed on to the selling price owing to the subdued demand during the winter season. Therefore focusing on maintaining market share, this created additional pressure on the gross margins. The pricing strategy is in line with industry trends and we expect the situation to improve in the upcoming quarters.
With the combination of these above factors, we have registered a gross margin of 26% as against 28.2% in Q3FY25. We expect some pressure to persist in Q4FY26 with a revival anticipated as we move into summer. We also took a one time provision of approximately 6 crores during the quarter towards the revised Labor Code guidelines which was counterbalanced by a positive impact of tax reversal relating to earlier years of rupees. 22 crores due to a favorable order at ITAC. In Africa, we delivered strong year on year revenue growth of 34.5% during the quarter driven by a focus and expansion in Kenya markets.
We are currently pricing our products competitively to gain market share and scale. In the nine month ended of Africa operations, we have done well in terms of our operations. We have actually increased our EBITDA from 31 crores to 39 crores although as a percentage it might seem slightly on the same percentages. Our profitability has increased in the nine months. We see a strong growth potential in East Africa dairy markets and towards that we are planning for a greenfield expansion project in Uganda where they secured a land parcel of 70 acres. We plan to do an indicative capex of around 50 to 60 years over a span of two years.
With this, we expect to expand our market share in East Africa from low single digits to high single digits. This will help Radla Dairy in capturing growing marketing opportunities in East African dairy sectors in the long term. Coming to Orga Feed, this business continues to deliver stable performance with double digit growth. The revenue for the quarter grew by 16% with an EBITDA margin of 11.6% in Q3. There was inflationary pressure on the raw material prices for the feed business which we did not pass on immediately to the customers to maintain pharma relationship. This resulted in some additional preserve on the margins.
We will be increasing our volumes and growing this business for the nine months. The Orga business has done well from a 13.4% EBITDA margin to around 14.3% EBITDA margin which is roughly an increase of EBITDA from 13 crores to 17.6 crores. As an absolute number, we continue to focus on product innovation. We have recently launched new offerings such as Masala, Paneer Chocolate, son Papadi milk cake and new flavor ice cream variants. As a people driven business, our priority remains a strong farmer and customer relationship. We are hopeful that we will reap the benefits of this healthy relationship in the upcoming quarters.
With this brief I now hand over to our CEO of our company, Mr. B.V. k Reddy. Thank you very much.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy — Chief Executive Officer
Thank you Mr. Sunil Reddy. So I will now walk you through consolidated performance highlights of our business. During the quarter our milk procurement stood 18.3 lakh litres per day which is an increase of 7.5% year on year basis. The average procurement cost in Q3FY26 stood 39.8 per liter as 37.3 per liter in the previous quarter and 35.6 per liter in Q3FY25. However, we did not pass on the entire increase in cost of the customers. Our average mill sales price for the quarter stood 57.7 per liter which was 57 rupees per liter in the previous quarter and 55 rupees per liter in Q3 of FY25.
This was a primary reason for our margin being under pressure during this quarter. We expect to mitigate this situation in the coming quarters. Additionally, since there is no increase in our fixed expenses pertaining to the OSOM business, we expect margin improvement once we start scaling up in terms of revenue. So now upcoming product sales mix Our liquid milk sales remained at a healthy level 13.9 lakh liters per day delivering a growth of 19.6% on year on basis. Total value added products stood 258 crores as well as 281 crores in Q3 of FY25. Excluding bulk sales, WAP delivered the growth of 23% on year on year basis.
Curt sales remained stable at 355 metric tons per day with a growth of 15.5% year on year basis. Other products like ghee, buttermilk, lyce, sea ice cream, flour, milk etc. Had a lower contribution compared to Q2 due to early offset of winter on year on year basis these projects continue to deliver healthy growth. So speaking to expansion projects, our Maharashtra project is progressing as per the scheduled timelines and is expected to start commercial operation by end of FY27. The civil work is under process and 69 crores worth investment is already been done and we also made a decent progress towards improving OSAM business operational efficiencies.
Since after the acquisition we are continuously working on improving its quality and upgrade the infrastructure. This will position OSAM to improve its contribution towards overall profitability once we start scaling up the revenues. Lastly as mentioned by Mr. Sunuriddy, we are also working towards the greenfield expansion in Uganda. The project will be completed in two phase manner. The phase one will be compromising comprising the diverse dairy portfolio including flavored yogurt and milk variants like you know, toned milk, skimmed milk and fulcrum milk. Value added products also such as Panees, cheese Ghee along with the mineral water.
Phase two will be expanding the long life milk ice cream and milk powder. This project is expected to start generating revenue by end of FY28. All these initiatives will help us to build a strong base for Dotla Dairy to capture the continuously growing opportunities in India as well as Africa and deliver a consistent growth for a longer period of time. We remain committed to discipline capital allocation and long term value creation for all the stakeholders. So with this Now I request Mr. Murlimohan Raju to share the financial results.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla — Chief Financial Officer
Thank you Mr. B.V.K. reddy and a very good afternoon to all the participants on the call talking about consolidated financial performance in Q3FY26. Revenue from operations for Q3 stood at 1025 crore. We staying a healthy 13.7 year on year growth compared to 991 crore in Q3FY25. Gross profit stood at 267 crores with a margin of 26% from this quarter. Our fixed expenses include impact of OSAP in fullness. Employee expenses for the quarter increased by 30% to 52 crore on a year on year basis. Other expenses increased broadly in line with the revenue as a percentage of sales and stood at 135 crore compared to 118 crore in Q3FY25.
However in absolute terms there was increase which was primarily driven by the volume growth of 15% on total dairy value. Infra addition towards rent, employees travel and conveyance cost as headcount during increase by approximately 250 employees. Higher transport costs due to a product mix shift from bulk sales towards liquid milk and value added products. EBITDA for the quarter stood a 79 crore with an EBITDA margin of 7.7%. Depreciation expense increased to 22 crore compared to 20 crore in the same quarter last year. Other income for the quarter grew by 8.3% to 12 crore on a year.
On year basis during the quarter we recorded exceptional items of 5.7 crore representing a one time impact due to an increase in gratitude liabilities arising out of post service costs on account of changes in labour loss. Additionally, we received 21.8 crores of tax reversal relating to earlier year due to favorable order at ITAC. Net profit for the quarter stood at 69 crore with net profit margin of 6.7%. Now coming to nine months FY26 performance. Revenue from operations grew by 8.5% year on year and stood at 3051 crore as compared to 2810 crore in previous year.
Gross profit stood at 8.8 crore up 4.4% on a year. On year basis, EBITDA for the period stood at 255 crore with EBITDA margin of 8.3%. We reported profit after tax of 197 crore with a PAT margin of 6.5%. Thank you.
Dodla Sunil Reddy — Managing Director
We are open for questions now.
Questions and Answers:
operator
Thank you very much. We will now begin with the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press Star and one on the Touchstone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question comes from the line of Kiran from Green Investors. Please go. Yes, you may proceed with your question. As there is no response from the current participant, we will move towards the next question.
The next question comes from the line of Sanjay Manial from Dam Capital Advisors. Please go ahead.
Sanjay Manyal
Hi sir, just have a few questions. One specifically regarding the. When are you expected to take the price hike to sort of safeguard from this higher procurement prices and what quantum of price hike would you require in the near term?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Basically we will be looking at it more from a point of view of the summer setting in based on the from a market point of view. So as the sales volumes start to shoot up, we normally take a price increase because we will have to compensate that lack of milk. But in terms the other way around, if procurement does come much earlier and if there is more milk, there will be a reduction in procurement and we will anyhow get the benefit of both.
I think the arbitrage that we will be looking at at the current moment will be anywhere between two to three rupees as a requirement of the price increase that we need to do across the board. Roughly we are now at a 6061 rupees as an average realization. And with the product mix we’ll have to make it to Rs. 63 or 64 rupees is where we’ll be looking at from a standalone India point of view.
Sanjay Manyal
Okay. Okay. And my second question about the value added part. So how should we sort of see the entire value added part over the next say few years? How it is likely to grow and what would be the larger composition of value added? I think as of now curd is the maximum of the value added part. How this will change and will it affect our capital because our working capital as of now is pretty lean. Will it also suppose if the value added part is sort of higher for Paneer and other value added product, will it impact working capital also over the next few years?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So basically our value added product portfolio has in fact grown from 23% to 25% compared last year to this year by 2%.
It was only the impact of what we had as our bulk sales which I think was close to around 250 or 300 crores that we had last year. That is not there this year but is showing the overall decline. Otherwise we’ve been having good growth in our value added products from 23 to 25%. Our milk growth has also been growing steadily because of the lack of the bulk volume that we have. It is showing a significant drop. Yes, they also despite having a bad summer where there was no summer and we didn’t sell our high value products, we’ve still been able to move our value added portfolio.
So in my view I think Paneer is also beginning to move inch up from our point of view of sales which I think has moved from around 1 ton to 34 tonnes. Ice cream is also moving and Curd will continue to move. Paneer will be a new entrant coming in with a volume based game that we’ll be playing with. So that will be the drivers for our value added component as a domestic part of India and I think over a longer period like I’ve always been repeating that it will have around a 30, 32% can be the targeted value added component in the overall composition.
Sanjay Manyal
And. On working capital funds how it would impact to work?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
It will remain the same sir, because whatever we do we either move it through distributors, we have only a very small exposure that we directly sell to the modern retail where it might be a 30 day payment but that number is very, very small. It won’t move. It will not move the needle at all. It is only the bulk commodity that the working capital will be required for.
Sanjay Manyal
Okay, thanks. Thanks for the answers.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Aditya from Securities Investment Management. Please go ahead.
Aditya Khandelwal
Yeah, hi sir. Thanks for the opportunity. So just wanted to check how the procurement price is trending in Q4. So generally we see Q4 has higher procurement prices than Q3. So is it the this year as well?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
See I think Q3 itself our prices have gone up. So Q4 is only a marginal difference of prices. This is what we anticipate our summer prices to be. That is up to the March season that we see. And unless there is going to be a significant drop in milk we don’t see any more further price increases happening in Q4.
Aditya Khandelwal
Understood sir. And secondly now this Africa expansion. So just wanted to understand how big a capacity we are putting in Uganda. And from what I understand we already have a good market share in Uganda. So this capacity is for any other country or for Uganda only?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Basically for Uganda only. What was earlier that we have as our capacity is for the flush, the variations that we have as earlier capacity. And that was predominantly designed for our long life milk. The newer expansion is for entering into a whole new category of pasteurized and day to day milk. Mr. BBK will explain it more in detail for you.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
Yes, in Uganda especially now we are planning only for Ugandan market. Only in Uganda I know the fresh milk sales is very dominant. Actually loose milk sales is more in especially in Kampala city. So our existing plant is more than 300 km away from the Kampala city.
Now what we acquired land is you know, is closer to the Kampala city capital city, 100 km closer to the city. So there we are planning a fresh milk in the Kampala city because we have a lot of scope because the local dairy is also fresh milk is selling and one more yogurt, you know capacity is already full. The existing plant and yogurt plant also. Now we are planning, you know, bigger yogurt plant in the new capacity. And apart from that also we are planning, you know, see maybe in future phase two, you know, ice cream, mineral water and some Indian products like paneer, some ghee.
See because a lot of Indian population also is there. So we take it up. This is now phase one and phase two.
Aditya Khandelwal
Understood sir. And sir, what is the capacity for this expansion and what kind of revenue potential would be possible on full utilization.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
So this now the new plant, what we are planning now we are planning to set up a 3 lakh liters capacity.
Aditya Khandelwal
So double down.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Yeah, doubling the existing capacity and revenue. You can roughly look at it at being around that 60 rupees litre kind of a scenario. So even if we do around 1 lakh, we can go to the 100 crores, 150 crores to start with.
Aditya Khandelwal
Understood. And if you have to understand what is the current market share in Uganda.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
That is a very difficult question because what happens is the unorganized loose milk that is extremely large to get specific data. But I think we can still look at it as reasonably large in terms of 3 to 5 lakh liters as the market that we are targeting as in this fresh and pasteurized milk segment along with the yogurt in yogurt, we are significant number one. Actually see the yogurt market. You know, if you see now overall Uganda yogurt market is only roughly about 1 lakh liters and then 50%, almost 40 to 50%. We are doing yogurt market.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
See this, it’s fresh milk, you know, fresh milk. It is totally still, it is unorganized.
Aditya Khandelwal
Understood sir. Understood sir. Next was an orga feed. So if I look at your revenues, they have stagnated around 40 crores for the last three quarters. So just wanted to get a sense, how is all of you doing now? Because I think we were guiding for around 1180 to 200 crores this year. But I think we will fall short on that. So just wanted to get some sense. How are you doing on that front?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Basically orga feed. Like you’ve always been saying that this year has been a weather anomaly of the summer not existing which is also a peak sale for Aurga. When there is no cattle feed available, shortage will be there and concentrate feed also increases. In spite of that we have been continuing to do so. The differential will only be off by a kind of a one month of a difference. In terms of revenue, I think already we are seeing uptake or increase coming in in Jan itself we are moving from our 5,000 crores to 6,000 tonnes of consumption.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Last year, if you see Agra feed quarter of quarter wise revenue which was very like 31, 32, 34 and 33 average around 33 crores. But if you see current quarter we are at. On quarter basis there is a 16% of growth in the revenue and on nine months period also there is almost 24% of growth in the revenue. Even if you see bottom line also even for the quarter little lower side. But if you 9 months period we are at 13.4% of EBITDA increased to 14.3 in absolute terms from 13 crores to 17 crores. So that is almost a 33% of growth in the EBITDA itself.
In the aga field we are going in the right direction as of now. But we agree that there is 1 crore of shortfall in the current quarter.
Aditya Khandelwal
Sure sir. Understood. And sir, what was the revenue and EBITDA for OSAM this quarter?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
I think this is a full quarter. And Murali will just be giving you the specifics.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Yes, the revenue for the last time we had only two months. That is 52 crores. For the current quarter it is 80 crores is the revenue and EBITDA. Last time it is 1.3. But this time it is only 85 lakh. Because of so much of streamline was there and SAP implemented and infrastructure was also increased.
Aditya Khandelwal
Understood sir. Got it. And lastly sir, what was the questions amount?
operator
We request that you to turn to. The questions for the follow up questions. Thank you. A request to all participants. Please restrict your question to one per participants. For more questions please rejoin the queue. The next question comes from the line of Aniruddh Dajosi from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Aniruddha Joshi
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity. And sir, congrats for a good set of numbers considering the macro environment. Two questions. There is an expectation of El Nino in this year. So how do you see the milk prices? Because mostly it may result in higher summer days or maybe weaker rainfall also. So if that happens, how are we protected? And. And second question. How are the cooperatives reacting to the. Milk inflationary situation means have they been. Proactive in terms of taking price hikes. Or there has not been much price hike. So how do we see the situation from a competitive perspective also? Yeah, thanks. Thanks for my side.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Thank you very much. Basically for. You know, in preparation of our Maharashtra itself we have added a lot more capacity in terms of procurement chilling centers. BVK will also give you the specifics as we go forward. It is as an ongoing scenario. But to your question, if there is an El Nino and there is a severe summer that comes in and if the gap between the sales and the procurement does keep on increasing, there will be no other option but to pass on the impact of cost to the customers.
And it will happen as a regular process that goes on. If the severe El Nino does come in, if not and if it is a regular year and I think it is my personal opinion that if the farmers have become more organized and if we don’t see that much of an impact it will maintain status quo and we will be able to take a price increase in the summer for as the regular other value added products will start to increase. Summer days are good which we missed in the current year financial year which what we missed in the current financial year.
Coming to the cooperatives it is becoming a little more I mean I think everybody is sort of maintaining the status quo. Not much of a difference. Maybe Amul might have done a little corrections here and there but otherwise I think everybody is maintaining a status quo more or less waiting to watch and see how the mid February and the beginning of marches will start to turn around in terms of temperature, climate and weather. BBK will explain a bit more in terms of the procurement and how we are trying to see to improve our procurement.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
Anuruddha if you see last year, the entire year from January to December we added roughly about 51 locations in the procurement so majority, you know CMCS and some chilling centers, all that infra whatever we added in this last financial year that is going to reflect in this coming years.
So we I think you know the kind of improv what we added. So any kind of situation, you know we will be self sufficient in our procurement. Maybe any cost, you know depends upon the overall market scenario. But as far as the volume is concerned know that we have done enough infra so we will not run short of any procurement.
Aniruddha Joshi
Yeah sure. So this is extremely comforting. Just one point. This year has been a bit softer for value added products considering the rainy season started early and in fact it ended also pretty late. So for next year do we see. Higher potential in the value added products especially ice cream and curd.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
More than ice cream. We are confident that our paneer and curd will move up the sale and OSAM also which we have acquired has a little lower in terms of value added products there as consolidated. But I think from a standalone of India minus Osam we will increase our Paneer Kurd and because of the summer comes as we think El Nino what we missed out on the first quarter of this year will again come back and will be showing stronger growth and I think it will do well for us this year.
Aniruddha Joshi
This is very helpful. Many thanks.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Thank you.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Faresham Jain from VVD Asset Managers. Please go ahead.
Resham Jain
Yeah. Hi. Good morning sir. So I have two questions. The first One is specifically with respect to paneer which is very small right now but growing at a very healthy clip. And as a byproduct we are also getting whey. So and India as a country anyways we have lower protein consumption per capita. So overall how are you thinking about growing both paneer as well as whey going forward?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
For us, paneer will not be compared to in terms of whey. Paneer will not be having that much of paneer in the next one year that it will come to the extent of looking at whey in the summer months.
We anyhow use the whey into our other fermented products as a regular operational process that we do. We have now moved from let’s say a 1 ton scenario to a 3.54 tonnes kind of daily sales of paneer which we are trying to see if we can push it more in terms of growth. I think the weight game will come in once we move Significantly larger to 10, 15 tonnes of paneer per day is when we will start adding the weight requirement. That is as far as the operation comes down in terms of paneer and protein requirements coming in some the operations of what we are looking currently as a standalone but also the other opportunity that we have is OSAM where currently it is only 13% of OSAM sale is value added products which we think we can also see a significant uptake there.
Even if you move it back to the 20% or so on the overall size that will also significantly add to terms of the overall value added portfolio as we go forward in the days to come. So paneer and way that is to your question and I think from a protein point of view we are all waiting to see significantly if it is going to move from a niche product to a little bit more of a mass product. And if it does even show some traction, I think most of us are ready to immediately be able to get into the higher protein market.
Because it’s not a very complicated part on the manufacturing side. It’s more on the placement and the demand offtake side.
Resham Jain
Understood sir. So the second question is with respect to Maharashtra, given that next year we will start decommissioning or we will commission our factory. So given that you can keep increasing procurement in that geography to begin with, what could be the like the ramp up plans in Maharashtra because you are already doing lot of procurement in that state.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
Right now we are doing around to 2 lakhs. 2 lakh 10,000 procurement for Maharashtra. We have planned, you know, so this financial end of this financial year Our own procurement will be around 5 lakhs.
So the infra we already creating, we have taken out manpower. The people are on the field and we keep on expanding. We’re adding new ceiling centers. So before commencing our plan to know we will live in Maharashtra. Roughly about 5 lakh liters. This addition will be another 3 lakhs. Existing is 2 lakhs. So addition there will be 3 lakhs procurement in this financial year. That is from a Maharashtra point alone sir.
Resham Jain
Understood sir. Thank you sir. In all the best.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Thanks.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Abhishek Mathur from Systematic group. Please go ahead.
Abhishek Mathur
Yeah sir. Thank you for the opportunity. First question is on the Uganda capacity expansion. So what is the current utilization for Kenya and Uganda if you can give and also for India, what will. How will this 50 to 60 crore be funded? Whether it be through internal accruals and when is the plant commencing for Uganda? That’s my first question.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So thank you very much. Basically what is happening is our Kenya plant is also reaching almost full capacity utilization. Uganda although we have a capacity that we keep declaring as 3 lakhs. Effectively from a curd point of view that plant has reached its own fulfillment. And the UHT lines and the other lines that we have still have that growth of capacity capacity. But like Mr. BVK explained earlier, now this we are looking at getting more of the opportunity of the fresh side of milk. And considering both the distance that is required and the pasteurizement segment which is larger than the UHT segment in Uganda.
We want to be in the whole milk cycle of the Ugandan country. And I think by going into the fresh milk we’ll do well. And also as DVK was saying earlier, this gives us opportunities because now we have got a well entrenched sales, distribution and collection scenario with even the addition of the other things. Although it might be small like mineral water or the ice creams, in the days to come we will be a significantly large player there. So that is the reason why we are looking at it as an expansion. To make sure that even for the next five, six years we will be able to be very comfortable without looking.
And also diversify our portfolio into other Indian products like Paneer which can cater to the local population as well as the Indian diaspora. Now bringing it to the point of the capital requirement, we generate healthy profits in Uganda and we will redeploy only those profits. We don’t need any additional money unless we see some opportunity of interest, arbitrage or any Other such things. Otherwise we have enough of internal approvals to take care of our own requirement of capital.
Abhishek Mathur
And so when is the plan commencing?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Two years from now. So we think it will be in the end of the financial year 28.
Abhishek Mathur
And just one last bookkeeping question for me. If you can give the console overall realization and the vaporization for the third quarter.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Well, the console for the third quarter realization vaporization console. Right sir.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Console relation is is 59 rupees console. Okay. Standalone for the quarter is 60.3. And when you talk about only milk realization is 58.15. For the standalone console 57.68.
Abhishek Mathur
Answer for vap for the vap concern.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Just a minute. I’ll just give you the details. For the WAP realization and…
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
VAP realization in India, per liter is basically it’s a mix of 251. For the value added products fart it is around 486 rupees.
Abhishek Mathur
And at the console level sir, for. The vap.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
It is a mix only. That’s what…
Dodla Sunil Reddy
The console level we that will be the console level only.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
But DDL India is only. If you talk about only DDL vap it is 65 rupees. Because it more depends on the product mix. LDL it is only 82 rupees. And fat products it is a 486 for DDL India.
Abhishek Mathur
Understood sir. Maybe I’ll take it offline or just a final one. In response to an earlier question, you said that in Maharashtra you will have. 5 lakh liters per day by the. End of the current financial year. Before commencement of the plant. Where is the 5 LLPD? Where is the 3 extra LLPD coming from? Just wanted to clarify that.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
See, the surrounding districts only. We are see targeting only from our main plant 150km radius. You see, we are setting a plant, you know, closer to the solar pore. 30 kilometers before solar pool. And we are concentrating only couple of districts closer to the plant. So radius is roughly about 150-175km radius we are concentrating.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
And to add to it that there is plenty of availability there. And that’s the reason we have also started that infrastructure. Like we explained earlier of these CMCs and chilling centers that we are beyond creating. So that I think it’s a balancing act of when the plant comes closer to production.
When do you push your procurement. So that is the way it will go forward.
Abhishek Mathur
All right sir. Thank you for the responses and all the best. Thanks.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Praveen Kumar From Equities Capital Advisors. Please go ahead.
Praveen Kumar
Yeah, hi, thanks for the opportunity. I had a couple of questions. The first one was on the procurement in terms of the exosam kind of a procurement growth. So there that that growth seems to have been only about 1% 1.2% year on year. So just wanted to understand, despite the contribution of Maharashtra to the procurement, if this ex OSAM procurement has only grown 1.2%, does that indicate that procurement in the non Maharashtra kind of geographies have kind of taken a dip during the year and if you could throw some light on that.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
No, Last year also it was inclusive of Maharashtra, which Maharashtra also had I think 1.5 or 1.6 lakh liters of procurement was already there.
It was not that came in the current year. Current year maybe it increased by the. It was only the OSAM that came in as additional. Yes, like we were saying, the whole reason of the shortage of milk in terms of the flush season, there has been absolutely no flush. So it’s been continuing to maintain only a flattish kind of growth in terms of no growth or being very flat in terms of volume of milk. And that is the reason why the. The whole reason of the price is increasing sir.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Excluding DDL India, the growth of the procurement is 3.74%.
Praveen Kumar
Okay.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
That is for the nine months.
Praveen Kumar
Right? Right. No, I was looking at more from. A Q3 to Q3 perspective that that. Growth seems to have been 0.21% down.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
It is always kind of flat.
Praveen Kumar
That’s the whole reason. So like last year there was what we call as a flush available. This year there has been absolutely no flushes. Understood. And the other quick question was on the margins. Right. See, I think for a nine month basis the EBITDA margin is somewhere around 8.3%. So just wanted to understand, you know, in previously you had talked about margin ranges being between 8 to 9% to 11%. So do you still think, you know, given the current challenges, that is a range that can be maintained over the next two to three years or you look at it differently.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
That will be the range.
Like I said, it’s always 1/4 issue like we had. In fact it’s a summer quarter not having the rains as well as the winter not having flush. It’s a very unique kind of a scenario. And even in that scenario we’ve been able to maintain our average 8% margin. So it is only optimism that it can only go up and not come down. So in a good year like last year, it will go up to the 10 11%. If it is a bad year it will move up to the rate 9% kind of a margin which we have been saying all the time.
Praveen Kumar
Understood. Thanks for the response.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Deepak from Unifi Capital. Please go ahead.
Deepak Lalwani
Hello sir. Thank you for the opportunity. So first question how much was the India volume growth or X of OSAM in liquid milk and in VAP separately?
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Yeah, India total overall growth including the bulk business milk is 4% excluding milk that is vap is minus 3 because these are the last year we had around 312 crores of the bulk business. If you exclude the bulk with regard to the milk business we have grown by 3% and non milk 3%. So 3.5. So overall average is also 4%. But if you see the excluding the bulk revenue when you talk about so 9% was the growth in the milk and 11% was the growth in the non milk without bulk. So overall the revenue was increased by 10%.
Deepak Lalwani
The follow up question to this is, you know what’s the company doing to increase the growth rate in terms of distribution, touch points or sacrificing on pricing because the growth rate for the company has fallen quite a bit. So if you can give some sense on this and second question is, you know the margin trajectory that you spoke about that this quarter would be the lowest. How should we look at it from a margin standpoint from Q4 and next year given that you have variable moving parts, procurement prices, your own price hikes, competition. So how should we view growth and margins per se?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So I think we are doing the lower volume growth for us.
I think actually we are taking it as even a tough year where we have lost one entire summer and also having a price pressure in the winter time we are able to maintain it is a 4,5% growth I think is more from a point of view of what the work has been done in terms of brand, brand recognition and deeper penetration that is happening. And I think it depends again if there’s a slight improvement in seasonality and this should have been a little more to come up to the 7% 8% very easily entire summer quarter that was lost is the reason why the overall is dropping and also good reasonably bitter winter that has been existing now and we expect that to come back to that 8, 10% of volume which we always keep saying that is in the little longer term, short term for this quarter we will know by end February March we can see what the uptakes in volumes are going to be like.
Now the other question coming to the the margins that we are looking at, I think we will be able to maintain this 8, 8.5% margins for the coming quarter also with the consolidated level of all Africa and all that. And there might be a slight dip from the India side because if you look at HR foods, it will be a little larger in terms of two quarters and there will be a lower margin there since we set it right. So that might bring it down a bit in terms of the overall but it will be very small overall.
We will be able to maintain these 8 to 9% margins for the fourth quarter and for the year.
Deepak Lalwani
Awesome. Got it. And so you mentioned about the Maharashtra performance plan. So if you can talk about the revenue plan from Maharashtra from starting the first year, how much, how much revenues do you expect to come and is it entirely B2C milk. B2B milk. And what kind of margins would you make in the first year considering the product mix and also the manufacturing cost that you have to intake?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So roughly we can look at a 500 to 600 crore of revenue in the first year coming in because I look at it very Simply as a BVK said, even a 3 lakh increase with a 200 crore per lakh litre, even if I consider it to be base commodity kind of a business also that will give that kind of 500 kind of crore of revenue.
That again I’m giving you two sides. One side saying if it is only a pure commodity and we are stuck with a 3% to 5% kind of an EBITDA margin that can add the 500, 600 crores into 3% will be the 1820 crores of EBITDA. If the volume of other products and sales comparatively in the matching size go up even a little more because even local sales of Sholapur will start and we will be in the initial tearing time that can also move up to 7, 6, 7% as in just that piece of the operation itself.
Because we will also be pushing more of the consumer GI and other such things. So the variation can be put as pure only bulk. And nothing we do also can be between 3, 4% or 5% and it can move to 7, 8% as a regular operation. So that is the range that it will be at. And considering a 500 to 600 crore kind of a top line, purely Maharashtra additional.
Deepak Lalwani
Understood. And sir, from Uganda, what should be the similar financial trajectory looking like for the new plant that we’re putting up the top line that we should build in and the margins I suppose are higher in Africa.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Yes sir. So Uganda, because it’s still two years away, we’ll have to wait and see exactly what we’ll find out by that time. But we are going at it now at least. To start with, in a year of operations commencement adding at least 100 crore of revenue. And normally when Uganda is also a little higher in terms of EBITDA margins, we can think of 15% kind of EBITDA margins on what we are going to be adding in the year one of operation itself. So in a couple of years, as soon as the plant turns on, that is the kind of operation size we’re looking at.
And in the longer term it has also got the much larger potential of growing. If we can cross that one and a half lakh litres kind of milk and product portfolio, it will be significantly larger.
Deepak Lalwani
Last question, sir. What’s the balance amount of Capex spending for the Maharashtra plant? How are we looking to fund it? And Uganda, apart from the land, how much Capex would be needed?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So basically Mudli will give the specifics. I think Uganda, as you said it’s a two year long process. We’re taking an additional 50, 60 crores for Uganda. And regarding Maharashtra, Murli will give you.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
That we have planned for 280 crores of Kathaks. Out of that 69 crores we already spent, 212 crores is yet to be spent.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
But all the orders have been placed. It’s only the timing of everything coming into place and going on.
Deepak Lalwani
And the funding of this would be internal approvals, Right?
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
As of now we are planning for subvention scheme. But the application is in process. If that happens before March, we will do that. We will utilize that. Otherwise we will go for the internal accruals. As of date we have around 630 crores in the bank. So we will utilize that.
Deepak Lalwani
Thank you so much. Thanks.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Siddharth from Chanakya wealth creation. Please go ahead.
Sidharth Negandhi
Hi. Thanks for the opportunity. Just wanted to understand. You spoke about the milk shortage. A. Are you seeing a milk shortage being more accentuated in cow milk or in buffalo milk? And in that context.
Venkat Krishna Reddy Busireddy
Sir, if you see the milk procurement in the first quarter, second quarter, third quarter, no, slightly, no overall procurement is coming down in India. India even in the buffalo milk also see not much of growth. See first quarter we have done, you know, standalone in CDL, you know 16.75 lakhs. But second quarter it became, you know, 16.7 and third quarter becoming, you know, 15 lakhs. So we are now fourth quarter. We are expecting MC now averaging at only 14 and a half lakhs. So again you know the first quarter of the next year, so may, it may go up.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So basically our buffalo is very, very small portions. We are majority only in cows. And it’s, I think it’s an overall all the areas the impact is there. It’s not only been one area here and there at India.
Sidharth Negandhi
Got it. And therefore in that context, the reason I was asking that is the bulk pack sales that were there this year, how should one think about those in context of the coming financial year? You know, based on this procurement strategy, do you see those bulk fat sales sort of coming down because they are both margin and working capital intensive margin dilutive and.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Yes sir, that’s what we didn’t have any bulk this year itself. Like if you take the quarter last year, the same quarter we had around 70 crores this year was zero, almost negligible. It was only 1 crore. We might in fact we might become net buyers rather than net sellers if there is a remaining shortage in the quarter coming up. So in fact whatever we have been gearing up for Maharashtra will only work out positive for us in terms of getting more milk into the system. Even if the drought sort of tends to continue failing, which we will then be moving back to our ability of moving into the commodity.
But as of now we don’t see any commodity happening in the near term.
Sidharth Negandhi
Got it. The second question was in terms of. Milk procurement prices being different across states. You know, with Maharashtra having added, are you seeing the weighted average price move up for your procurement? And, and therefore in, in context of, you know, that plan of 5 lakh liters per day, how should one think of procurement prices on a weighted average basis?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So Maharashtra, because it’s got a lot more of a commodity players, the yo yo effect is significantly higher in Maharashtra. Like I said, if you compare it this year Maharashtra has gone up 10% compared to the rest of the states going by 6%. But when the drop happens, Maharashtra also drops significantly. So I think as an average we normally see Maharashtra to be a lower priced player than a high priced cost player. It is only that it goes through that little bit of that high and low seasonality that comes into play. So that is what it will be.
And the overall basket will always sort of not be significantly larger. It will be in the averages. They’ll all be the same.
Sidharth Negandhi
Got it. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who Wishes to ask a question. May press star and 1. The next question comes from the line of Resham Mehta from Green Edge Wealth. Please go ahead.
Resha Mehta
Thank you. So clearly this has been, you know, a challenging quarter. And if I were to look at, you know, the India standalone numbers and exclude fat revenues, right. So there’s been a challenge here in terms of growth for the last one and a half years, almost two years now. Right. So in FY25, if I were to exclude, you know, the fat revenues, we grew at 7% versus FY24. And even if I look at the first nine months and if I were to exclude the fat revenues from the India standalone numbers, we seem to have grown in low single digits.
So what is the challenge here in India standalone numbers, excluding fat? Are there, you know, certain, you know, gaps or, you know, specific challenges gaps in terms of execution which, you know, we are trying to fix or if you would like to talk about. And also in that context, you know what is there some market share loss that has happened in the India business? Because if I look at our peers, the two southern listed peers, right. They have still grown in their India business, right. Over the last almost two years. So and also your market share estimates, if any, are they based on internal estimates or do we subscribe to any syndicated data like Nielsen.
Yes.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Indicated that our market share estimates are only our own. But compared to the things that we are saying is that the volume growth, but we look at it as a 4% I think even with the listed peers do not be significantly different in terms of it. It is only that value add or the bulk sales that keep adding the differential of moving it around. The major issue that we think is that the cooperators which are normally as comparatively sell it at a lesser and we are more of a. I mean the private sector being more at a premium sale.
The B2B business is not something that we normally get to and I think from the overall consumption pattern most of the states we are there that the conversion from unorganized to organized is sort of over and it’s only the organized consumption growth that we are trying to cater to and keep getting more of the market share that grows. There are no more white spaces that are available. That is why we are doing our acquisitions and growing into northern India and certain territories where there’s more of white space availability, existing markets. That is the reason why we look at them as lower.
That’s the reason that we see lower trends that the unorganized organized is declining a and the B2B going to more of the cooperators on a pricing ground and we taking up more of the premium consumer market share is where it will be there.
Resha Mehta
So from the southern markets, would it be fair to say that we have fairly become like a mature player there? Is that what you’re trying to suggest? And hence the route to grow in Indian market could largely be inorganic.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Inorganic, yes, from the liquid milk side. But I think again we’ll have a little more opportunity coming from the product side where the consumption pattern in the southern states as the GDP is growing up more than liquid milk, it will start adding into the paneers and. The. Curd and the lassi and buttermilk, those will start moving in more, the value add will start moving in a little more and the liquid milk will also move, but not in that significant volumes.
Resha Mehta
And the second question is on the price hikes. So I think you did allude to the price hikes which will be taken when the summer sets in. So would it be fair to say that, you know, we won’t be able to take price hikes before March end or early April, which means any uptick that we see in terms of margin will largely happen in, you know, the Q1 of the next financial.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Not that way. I think the definition of summer is going to be where we’ll have to wait and watch. If the temperatures start moving up in say mid February, March, then the uptake will start happening from March failing, which it will be from April onwards. Definitely. Because I’m sure this cold weather waves are not going to continue from last year to the current year also. And let me know what the prediction is that it will be the other extreme now of severe summers.
Resha Mehta
The last question is basically on the Africa business. So for nine months what’s been the broad revenue split between Uganda and Kenya and even between those two nations, do we see any differential in the margin? And also if you could explain what is. So we’ve seen milk inflation in the African business as well. So typically what is the seasonality or cyclicality in terms of milk inflation there?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So Africa also does go through a seasonality of the winter rains, monsoon and summer coming in. Uganda is a low volume, high margin country of operation. Kenya is a significantly larger volume and comparatively to Uganda maybe 2,3% in terms of margin being a lower margin. And we also have the interplay between Uganda and Kenya as these two countries sometimes when there is a shortage, if Kenya allows, we move more cheaper milk from Uganda into Kenya. And if the country does not allow it, so as a combined margin is what we maintain as both. That’s the reason why we call it as Africa because it sort of interlinked as both the countries.
Kenya. I think my market numbers are just my estimates or our company’s estimates. We think of it as a 40 to 50 lakh litre kind of a market that is there in Kenya in comparison to Uganda maybe being a 10 to 12 lakh litre kind of a market. So that is where we operate as overall. And Murli will give you the specifics of the Kenyan revenue. Ugandan revenue.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Overall revenue we added around 354. Out of that the major revenue LDL is 229crores and CDDL is 142crore.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
LDL being Uganda and CDL being Kenya.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
CDL being Kenya. There will be some intercompany transactions. 229. Uganda, Kenya is around 142.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
And like Murali was saying, but we will have intra company like I said earlier, sometimes we do sell product from Uganda into Kenya also.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Company it is 354 crores.
Resha Mehta
This is nine months, right?
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Nine months.
Resha Mehta
And so just one follow up to the first question. Why don’t we subscribe to some, you know, syndicated data like Nielsen or something of that sort. Any special.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
The data that we have already subscribed vastly varying from what they give to what we see on the ground. The compatibility is becoming different because the company to company definition of the area itself is becoming very difficult. Like for me what Hyderabad city definition is, whether it’s a pin code of Hyderabad or some people will say that the geographical area in terms of ring road being verified and when we compare that to the on ground reality, the variations are being significant. So that is the reason we do get some data. But they are not correlating to what our ground reality says.
But we will try to see maybe offline if you can help us in recommending anything. We will also try to see how best they can work for us.
Resha Mehta
Sure, sure. And so lastly, just a clarification, Uganda has 2 to 3, 200 to 300 bits higher margins versus Kenya, right?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Yes.
Resha Mehta
All right, thank you so much. All the best.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Thank you ma’am.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press N1. The next question comes from the line of Ankit Shah from White Equity. Please go ahead.
Ankit Shah
Thanks for taking my question. Just wanted revenue and EBITDA for Africa business for current quarter and same quarter last year. If you can share that.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Yeah. Current quarter revenue Africa is 133 crores last year, same quarter it is 98 crores. So there is a 34 crores of increase was there. That is almost 35%. Second EBITDA current quarter it is 17 crores. Last year it is 8 crores. That is an increase of 8.7 crores. So overall there is a 105% of increase for the quarter nine month period. If you see. Yes. 31 crores increased to 39 crores. There is a 77% of increase in the EBITDA revenue is two hundred and seventy six crores to three hundred and fifty four crores. That is 77 crores increase. That is 28% of revenue increase.
Ankit Shah
Right. So asset, our margins have actually improved in Africa whether we look at this quarter or nine months. That’s right.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Yes sir. Our revenues have improved in. Sorry. Our margins have improved in Africa. As. A percentage amount means lower because we had a significant growth in volume. But as an absolute number there is a improvement.
Ankit Shah
Okay. Okay. All right. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Vandana from Common Capital. Please go ahead.
Vandana Rathi
Oh yeah, hi sir. So my question is so Dawdler has always been basically the first mover in breaking ties hike. But this time you say that you have not taken price hike to maintain market shares. So I just wanted to ask what have other players done in the market in terms of price hikes?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Nobody has taken a price hike per se because like we said it’s normally we have a surplus in the winter months and then there is a more of a procurement game. There’s a peculiar time when we didn’t have anything in the winter months itself and in the winter months itself markets are subdued. I think it will be in another couple of months once we see how the summers pan out that there will be the price increases that will have to be passed on to the customer. So I think like we always say that the impact normally which used to be a quarter which used to take time to decide where they stabilize and pass on.
This year it is extended not for one quarter but maybe for a little more than a quarter that it is there. So we will have to make that call. I think as the following months come into play and we see how the weather patterns play out.
Vandana Rathi
Okay. Okay, thank you sir. So next question. So I just wanted to know, see all, most of your peers are, you know, increasing their VAP shares and so how do you see that as a competition currently?
Dodla Sunil Reddy
So vap even our shares have increased. If you look at it minus the bulk sales that we have done, we have grown from 23% to 25% which is 2%. And we keep saying that because the overall pie is larger. But it is difficult to say that more than the 2% growth that we look at. And also when we look at OSAM that we have added as an acquisition in the consolidated basis that will bring it down a little more because there Africa has been only, sorry, OSAM and Bihar has only been 13%. I think once we improve that in the overall we will show.
But I think standalone we have grown from 23% to 25% in the VAP compared to last year in spite of having a, a bad summer where we didn’t, we didn’t sell any of the higher value added VAP products like Lassi buttermilk and ice cream which also came down. In spite of that, we have down 2%.
Vandana Rathi
Got it, sir. Thank you so much.
operator
Thank you ladies and gentlemen. That was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments. Thank you. And over to you, sir.
Dodla Sunil Reddy
Thank you very much everyone for joining us today on our earning call. We appreciate your interest in Birdla Dairy. If you have any further queries, please contact sga, our investor relation adviser. Thank you very much once again. Have a great day.
Murali Mohan Raju Reddycherla
Thank you all.
operator
Thank you on behalf of Durdla Dairy Ltd. That concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us in New Minow. Disconnect your lines. Thank you.