The Tribune, Chandigarh, India

	Indian firms top world sales growth: E&Y London, July 14 Indian companies’ sales growth has soared past the rest of the world in the past five years, posting annual average rises of 27 per cent compared to just 5 per cent for firms in developed countries, an Ernst and Young survey found. Indian sales growth was also far higher than the average of 16 per cent for the developing world as a whole, according to the 2006-2010 study which compared the performance of 150 companies in rapid-growth markets with 80 leading US and European firms. "Some of these gains (in developing countries) are due to the exceptional growth of their domestic economies. Others have benefited from rising raw materials prices, particularly mining and oil and gas companies," Ernst & Young said. "Developed market companies suffered more from the financial crisis than those from rapid-growth markets. Except for a knock against exports, the economic downturn was experienced as a distant concern in the rapid-growth markets. After India, Brazilian companies saw the next fastest growth of with a 22 per cent rise on a compounded annual average basis, followed by Russia and China with 17 per cent each. Malaysian, Polish, Indonesian and South African firms also enjoyed double-digit sales growth, the study showed. Companies from the developing world also enjoyed better operating margins, posting an average of 24 per cent compared with 18 per cent for the developed market companies. Ernst & Young said while lower labour costs and lighter regulation were partly behind the better margin performance, it added: "Margins are also increasingly being driven by the fact that many of these companies are now world-class operations that command real intellectual property." Moreover, the study found that 31 per cent of the world's top 1,000 companies by market capitalisation now come from the rapid-growth markets. This is up from 10 per cent in 2000. — Reuters Indian companies posted growth of 27 per cent compared to just 5 per cent for firms in developed countries and 16 per cent average growth in developing world as a whole.
	Export of non-basmati rice Government’s move to boost exports Bhanu P. LohumiI/tns Karnal, July 14 With government godowns overflowing with over 65 million tonnes of foodgrain against storage capacity of only 62.23 million tonnes and position further tightening with arrival of fresh paddy crop, the decision of Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) to allow export of 1 million tonne of non-basmati rice would not only solve the problem of storage of foodgrains but also boost rice exports. The Agriculture Ministry has pegged total foodgrain output at 245 million tonnes for the 2011-12 crop year, as against 235.88 million tonnes last year and the demand for export of non-basmati rice and wheat was gaining ground. Even the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Commerce had strongly pleaded for lifting the ban on export of superior non-basmati rice to create storage capacity for new crop. “The buffer stock of foodgrain is around 65 MT as against a desired level of 30-35 MT as central pool collected 65.6 MT of wheat and rice in June this year, almost triple the quantity collected five years ago,” say FCI officials. The government had banned shipments of wheat in early 2007 and non-basmati rice in April 2008 to bolster domestic supplies but in spite of bumper crops and overflowing godowns, the food inflation, which was 7.61 per cent at present, has not come down. “The lifting of ban on export of 5 per cent broken rice which is not used for PDS would help rice exporters to trade in both basmati and non-basmati rice and maintaining the price level in the domestic market,” says Vijay Setia, president, All India rice Exporters Association.
	Poultry farmers suffer huge losses due to viral infection Ruchika M. Khanna/tns Chandigarh, July 14 Unable to understand the dynamics of demand and supply and inability to prevent viral infections at their farms, small and marginal poultry farmers in the region are slowly being pushed out of business. Many small and marginal poultry farmers in Ismailabad in Haryana, and in Sunam and Sangrur belt of Punjab, have reported a high mortality rate of broilers, owing to viral infection. Farmers claim that as against a normal mortality rate of 5 per cent, the mortality rate in broilers has gone up to 25 per cent owing to the viral infection. Mukesh Madan, a small poultry farmer in Ismailabad, informed The Tribune that because of the viral attack on broilers, there was a high mortality rate at his farm. “With many of these birds now dead, small farmers have suffered huge losses,” he said. The farmers say that this year many of the small farmers shifted their layer farms to hatcheries, leading to an over production of chicks. “Last year, there was a shortage of parent stock in the market, and those running hatcheries did an excellent business. So, in the hope of making higher profits many small and marginal farmers, too, shifted to hatcheries. This led to a flooding of chicks in the market, and their prices crashed. From Rs 25 per bird in March, the prices have come down to Rs 5- 6 per bird now,” said G S Bedi, president of Amritsar Poultry Industries Association.
	TCS Q1 profit up 27 pc at Rs 2,415 cr Mumbai, July 14 Country's largest software company Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) today posted 26.7 per cent rise in its net profit at Rs 2,415 crore for the first quarter of FY 2011-12. The revenue grew by 31.4 per cent to Rs 10,797 crore for the period under review, TCS said. However, sequentially the profit has declined as the company had posted Rs 2,623 crore profit in the last quarter of the previous fiscal. "Our customer-focused organisation and balanced business model helped us drive growth across all our major customers segments and operating regions in the first quarter," TCS CEO N Chandrasekaran said. The board has proposed a dividend of Rs 3 a piece on shares of the face value of Re 1. During the June quarter, the software exporter added 3,576 persons, taking the total headcount to 2,02,190 as on June 30. The company during the quarter added 24 new clients. — PTI
	Inflation rises to 9.44% in June New Delhi, July 14 Headline inflation rose to 9.44 per cent in June on the back of rising prices of fuel and manufactured products, which may prompt the RBI to raise key rates again in its quarterly policy review later this month. Inflation, as measured by the Wholesale Price Index (WPI), stood at 9.06 per cent in May. It was 10.25 per cent in June, 2010. Meanwhile, as per data released by the government today, the overall inflation figure for April this year has been revised upward to 9.74 per cent from the provisional estimate of 8.66 per cent. The rise in inflation can partly be attributed to the hike in prices of diesel, cooking gas and kerosene announced by the government on May 24. The higher prices of petroleum goods, according to experts, is adding to supply side constraints. The index for the fuel and power segment, which has a weight of almost 15 per cent in the WPI basket, stood at 12.85 per cent year-on-year in June. This was up from 12.32 per cent in the previous month. — PTI
	Food inflation up at 8.31% New Delhi, July 14 Snapping a two-week declining trend, food inflation rose to 8.31 per cent for the week ended July 2 on the back of soaring prices of protein-based items, cereals and vegetables. Food inflation, as measured by the Wholesale Price Index (WPI), rose by 0.70 percentage points during the week under review vis-a-vis the previous week. The rate of price rise in food items stood at 7.61 per cent in the previous week, ended June 25. As per data released by the government today, fruits and milk became 13.54 per cent and 12.39 per cent costlier, respectively, during the week under review. Prices of protein-based items like eggs, meat and fish went up by 11.95 per cent annually. Furthermore, cereals became 5.40 per cent costlier, while vegetable prices were up by 2.25 per cent. Prices of onions shoot up 30.72 per cent on an annual basis. — PTI
	EPFO appoints SBI, three others to manage funds New Delhi, July 14 The EPFO today decided to appoint four fund managers, including SBI and ICICI Securities, to manage its corpus of Rs 3.5 lakh crore for three years beginning September 1, 2011. Besides SBI and ICICI Securities, Central Board of Trustees (CBT) also approved the names of Reliance Capital and HSBC Asset Management Company (AMC). The CBT, however, dropped the name of ICICI Prudential which was recommended by the EPFO's Financial Advisory Council (FIC) earlier in the day, sources said. As many as 10 companies had shown interest in managing the corpus of the EPFO. The other companies which were in the race for managing the EPFO funds were Kotak Mahindra AMC, Securities Trading Corporation of India among others — PTI
	Gold glitters at Rs 23,220 New Delhi, July 14 The gold prices surpassed all previous records as they spurted by Rs 170 to Rs 23,220 today, on brisk buying by stockists, driven by a firm trend in the international markets due to the deepening Euro debt crisis. The yellow metal crossed its last record level of Rs 23,175 set on April 30 this year. Similarly, silver spurted by Rs 2,300 to Rs 57,300 per kg, in line with the general firming trend. Market analysts said the trading sentiments remained bullish as gold in international markets climbed 0.66 per cent to a record $1,593 an ounce, as concern about Europe's debt crisis spurred demand for the yellow metal. — PTI
	3G Services Vodafone, Bharti, Idea join hands New Delhi, July 14 In an effort to reduce cost and offer pan-India 3G service, Vodafone, Bharti Airtel and Idea Cellular have started sharing their networks to provide seamless service to their customers. The three will now use each other's networks through inter and intra-circle roaming arrangements where they do not have licences. "Vodafone has entered into a bilateral roaming agreement, both inter and intra circle, with Idea and Airtel to provide 3G services to our customers in the circles where we have not built our own 3G network, in order to bring a pan-India experience of 3G services to our customers," Vodafone said. However, nobody divulged the revenue sharing arrangement among the operators. Roaming agreements, both inter and intra circle, are the norm in the Indian telecom industry since they help a service provider offer seamless service to its customers, the spokesperson added. — PTI