A tractor manufacturing factory, ranking among the top ten factories in the world, with an annual profit of more than 100 billion yuan. Then, this factory must be in India.
Yes, in the field of agricultural machinery, especially tractors, this Indian factory called Mahenda is a giant.
my country claims to be a world factory and has a developed manufacturing industry. So, is my country's tractor brand even more awesome?
is ashamed to say that although Chinese manufacturing is penetrating into various fields of the world, it is indeed a bit worse than India in terms of tractors.
It is said that China has been working hard in Africa for many years, but it involves its vital interests. Even the big African brothers know how to choose Indian tractors.
In 2019, Zambia bids around the world, intending to import 80 horsepower medium-sized tractors and smaller power small tractors. Because old giants such as Europe and the United States mainly promote large tractors, this time they are not professional and have not participated. When Shanghai Deyuan Company heard this, he became active: Since the masters don’t come, isn’t it our turn to show our face? So he went there excitedly, but he returned in a defeat.
Zabia buyers tried Chinese and Indian tractors respectively. To be honest, Indian tractors are much higher than Chinese tractors in terms of price and quality.
Zambia is not accidental. Indian tractors are indeed leading the way in the world. In 2017, Indian tractor factories produced one-third of the world's production.
In 2021, India's tractor exports were not affected by the epidemic, and it soared by 72% compared with the same period in 2013, with exports exceeding US$1 billion, mainly exporting to the United States, Nepal , Bangladesh and other South Asian countries.
In the nearest hot spot in Africa, due to economic restrictions, Africa mainly purchases small and medium-sized tractors. This part of the market has basically been eaten by India.
In contrast, my country's total export volume of tractors in 2021 is only US$700 million, mainly exported to Russia, Ukraine and France. my country has also exported agricultural machinery to Southeast Asian countries, but the result is embarrassing. Because it is not suitable for local conditions, all of these agricultural machinery have been returned.
It is said that Chinese manufacturing is on the rise, so why can Chinese tractors not compare to Indian tractors?
The first reason is development history
This Indian company that defeated Shanghai Deyuan in Zambia is called Mahenda. It is a complete old senior in the field of tractors and has a history of 75 years.
As early as 1945, China had just ended the War of Resistance Against Japan, and before modern India could break away from British colonization, the two brothers in the Mahenda family established this company. In 1955, Mahengda was already a listed company.
And my country's tractor factory just broke ground at this time. On October 1, 1955, my country's first tractor manufacturing plant was launched in , Luoyang, Henan. In 1958, China's first tractor, "Dongfang Red", drove down the production line with red and colorful colors.
However, this is just a tractor, and my country's tractors have not yet been mass-produced. It was not until 1959 that 's first tractor manufacturing plant was completed and mass production of Oriental Red Tractors began.
However, in India, Mahengda has already operated tractors as its largest business. Not long afterwards, in 1961, Ma Hengda cooperated with the American agricultural machinery giant IHC to jointly develop new models, and then entered the US market naturally. In 1983, Mahenda tractor sales ranked first in India and has not changed for many years since then.
During this period, China also established multiple tractor manufacturing plants of all sizes across the country. However, in the upcoming market economy, these Chinese tractor manufacturers have to face a cruel fate. This has to talk about the second reason why it dragged the Chinese tractors back.
The second reason is that technology investment
In the 1990s, India's Mahengda Manufacturing Factory had become a huge multinational company, and its business projects included not only tractors, but also machine tools, automobiles and even finance and IT.
However, tractor factories of all sizes in China are struggling in a strange market economy at this time.my country's first tractor manufacturing factory, which is today's China-drag , naturally has strong support from the state. However, other small and medium-sized factories mostly rely on themselves. Therefore, some factories went bankrupt due to poor management, and some factories blindly pursued cooperation with foreign capital, but were hidden and disappeared from now on.
In the cruel market competition, my country's manufacturing plants ignore improving technology, but they all fought a price war, striving to eat the market through low prices, and even lose money to gain publicity. As a result, many small manufacturers were seriously injured, which also caused the strange phenomenon of "whoever gets first will die first". The essence of the phenomenon of
is actually what we are talking about today: there are too many manufacturers, the products are the same, and the performance is similar, so we can only rely on the price of the coil to increase sales. In the end, of course, whoever sells more will lose more.
In order to survive while winning the price war, manufacturers have put their minds on splicing. After all, it is always easier to assemble imported parts by themselves than to develop them from scratch.
Moreover, the Chinese government has provided a large amount of subsidies for the tractor industry, and some manufacturers do not even want to assemble and only think about how to play some wrong ways to cheat subsidies. This has laid the root of low prices and low quality in my country's tractors and even the entire agricultural machinery field.
At present, there are more than 2,000 agricultural machinery enterprises in China, which is not small. However, there are only about 100 companies that can independently develop. Therefore, in the field of agricultural machinery, there is still a long way to go from manufacturing in China to manufacturing in China.
Does Chinese tractor still have a chance to turn over?
says that the first-mover advantage in the manufacturing industry is difficult to break. Compared with our country, India has a similar population, cheaper labor, and classic old brands. So, does China's tractor manufacturing still have a chance to turn around?
In the long run, China's development trend towards high-end manufacturing is unstoppable. However, it has to be admitted that at present, there are indeed many problems to be solved.
In 2004, the country began to implement agricultural machinery subsidies. The country entered a golden decade. After a decade of total output value and total power soared, it ranked first in the world in 2016. However, most of these agricultural machinery are still concentrated in the mid- and low-end fields. Compared with old foreign factories, their brand awareness is not very ideal, and they even have quality flaws.
For example, the working time of foreign mainstream agricultural machinery products can reach 100 hours without faults, while similar products in my country can only reach 50 hours. As the saying goes, people mislead people for a while, and people for a year. At the critical moment of rushing to farm, the working time without faults is an absolute hard indicator. If you can't keep up with others in this indicator, don't mention sales.
Moreover, the historical problem in my country is that it is despising basic research. The long-term idea of "it is better to buy than to make" has led to a serious shortage of manufacturing talents in my country. Some masters are very worried about the failure rate of tractors in our country. They only see that the tractor's horsepower is getting bigger and bigger, but there are also more and more minor problems, which seem to be no match for the old products that were strong and durable thirty years ago.
Compared with India, my country has a special national condition, which is "bottleneck". In the 1960s, India's Mahendda Company was able to actively participate in the international market and conduct joint production with European and American companies. However, my country's tractor manufacturing industry, especially heavy tractor technology, has to find breakthroughs on its own, and even obtain relevant technologies through mergers and acquisitions of foreign small and medium-sized enterprises.
However, China's manufacturing industry has seen even more difficult situations, so it will not be scared by the current difficulties. my country's number one tractor manufacturing company, China Yituo, which was born in the first tractor manufacturing factory, has already planned to overtake and make a step forward in the new field of tractors.
The new field that China Yituo targets is an unmanned autonomous tractor, which is also an important part of smart agriculture . With the help of , , and Tsinghua University , in October 2018, China Yitu released the first unmanned tractor in China.Even if there is no driver sitting inside, it can complete field work such as farming, plant protection, etc. on its own, marking that my country's tractors have entered the intelligent era.
Generally speaking, my country's advantage lies in the comprehensive and large scale of in the industry chain, and all kinds of equipment can be self-sufficient. It has also begun to pay attention to investment in basic research and development, but there are indeed some shortcomings in technology. It seems that it will take a lot of time for our country's tractors to catch up with the international advanced level.
