Lely order book 'slightly better'
Dairy automation company Lely reported a 3.4% decline in total turnover last year but notes that sales are picking up.
In numerical terms, India accounted for around 36% of the estimated 2.5 million tractors sold worldwide last year.
Indeed, the 2023 figures were not only higher than the 900,000 tractors sold in 2021 and 2022, but a huge increase on the 700,000 units five years ago.
Building more than 150,000 tractors at its factories every year, Mahindra is the market leader, followed by another big player called Tafe and numerous other brands including Escorts, Farmer, and Sonalika. The Indian tractor market is also supplied by companies BCS, Argo with its McCormick and Landini brands, John Deere, New Holland, and SDF.
With an agricultural area of over 200 million hectares (140 million hectares cultivated and more than half irrigated), compared to New Zealand that has 13.8 million hectares (53.4% of total area) under agricultural use, the value of the Indian tractor and equipment market is expected to exceed €15 billion by 2025, rising from €11 billion in 2020.
