The Post Graduate Programme in Agribusiness Management (PGP-ABM) of IIM Ahmedabad is a sector specific programme with an objective of providing world class managerial talent to the Food and Agribusiness sector.

The final placements for the PGP-ABM batch of 2011 saw a variety of roles on offer across sub-sectors such as Food Processing, Agricultural Inputs, Rural Banking and Insurance, Commodity Trading, Food and Agribusiness Advisory, Farm Management and Information Services for Agriculture. 23 companies participated in the placement process this year, making 41 offers to the batch of 36 participants. All of the students of the PGP‐ABM batch participating in the Placement process have been placed. Two students had opted out of the placement process to pursue their own entrepreneurial ventures. The number of students availing Placement services this year was almost double the number last year, due to an increase in the batch size.

Companies like Godrej Agrovet and IFMR Trust made Pre-Placement Offers (PPOs) showing their faith in the PGP‐ABM programme and its participants. This year, there were a slew of new recruiters on campus.

Among these, Excel Crop Care and Shapoorji Pallonji Group made four offers each in different functional areas like Strategy, Market Intelligence, General Management and Farm Management. Companies like Sharp Group and Krishidhan Seeds Ltd. offered Strategic and Supply Chain roles making three offers each. Among other new recruiters were Heinz, Axis Bank, HDFC Ergo, Bengal Tools, Agrocom, InGovern Research Services and Amalgamated Plantations. The batch also received a good response from traditional recruiters such as Marico, Godrej Agrovet, TATA Rallis along with NCDEX.

The functional roles offered ranged from Strategy, Marketing, Sales and Distribution, Supply Chain Management, Procurement, Operations, Consulting, Research and Advisory. Certain roles involve a high level of responsibility, viz. Country Manager, General Manager Operations, Executive Assistant to CEO, Strategic role reporting to Executive Director of a group and Venture Analyst for a Venture Capital fund focused on Agri-Startups. A special mention here would be about the geographic diversity of the roles.

This year, we saw roles with international exposure being offered to four students in countries such as Brazil, Ethiopia and Zambia. These offers are made by Indian companies expanding into foreign territories.

Final placements 2011 for the PGP‐ABM batch had started on February 12th 2011. By February 15th, only two PGP-ABM students remained in the placement process. The two students had very specific career preferences along with locational constraints. While it has taken more than one month to place these two students, we are pleased to inform that both the students have secured offers from firms of their choice. This strengthens our resolve to focus on recruiter‐recruit fit and provide sufficient choice to the students.

According to Sagar Desai, Secretary of student placement committee for PGP-ABM, “The Agribusiness sector is growing rapidly and there is substantial need for sector specific managerial talent. This is evident from the quality of roles that were on offer and level of responsibility associated with these roles.”

The institute will release a detailed placement report for the PGP-ABM batch in a few days. This report would be as per the Placement Reporting Standard proposed this year by IIMA. We are now in the process of collating the data for the report. Source by coolavenues.com