Why Kenneth Andrade is buying Kaveri Seeds

Many years ago, an unknown fund invested in Kaveri Seeds.

Disclosure: Invested as on 27th March 2025. Read full Disclosure at Bottom 🔻🔻

Special Thanks to Mr. Jatin Khemani of Stalwart Advisors 🙏🏽 for his guidance related to this article.

Between 2012-2015, the stock went up 10X and the fund manager - Samit Vartak of Sage-one advisors shot to the SMID (small & Mid-cap) Hall-of-fame.

Sadly, the party ended in December 2015 when the Government included Cotton under the Essential commodities Act.

This allowed the GOI to control the price of cotton Seeds !

So, what?

So, 70%+ of Sales for Kaveri Seeds came from Cotton seeds. It was among the Top 3 suppliers of cotton Seeds in the Country with a Market share of 18% in 2015.

At the time, many cotton seed players were selling at ~ Rs 1200-1600/packet (450 Grams).

Sorry, said the Government and set a Pan-India MRP of 800/packet of Bollgard-2 Seeds (Read: BollWorm Guard 2 or BG2).

It also fixed the Royalty paid to Monsanto - the technology owner of Bollgard-2 seeds and one of largest seed companies in the world.

🌱 Monsanto & The Bt Cotton Revolution in India

In 2002, a quiet revolution began in Indian agriculture — and Monsanto was at the center of it.

India approved the first genetically modified seed - Bt cotton, developed by Monsanto to fight the bollworm pest, which had long plagued Indian cotton farmers. Few could have predicted the scale and speed of what came next.

What Changed?

✅ Adoption was explosive

• From less than 2% of cotton acreage in 2002, Bt cotton spread like wildfire, accounting for over 90% of all cotton acreage by 2013, or roughly 11 million hectares.

Farmers who once relied on multiple pesticide sprays each season now had a biotech solution baked into the seed.

✅ Yields climbed

• The average yield jumped from 302 kg per hectare in 2001 to over 550 kg/ha by 2013.

✅ Production surged