An Alumni Talk was organized by KIIT School of Rural Management (KSRM) for the students of MBA(RM) and MBA(ABM) on 20th February 2021. The speaker, Mr. Prabeen Kumar Singh provided an overview of cotton farming in the world. The sector is a leading one in the developing countries and the textile value chain is one of the longest value chains in agricultural commodities.
He highlighted the challenges in the sector across the value chain, especially in the context of sustainability, like high use of pesticide in India, water footprint for production of garments, exploitation, gender inequality, difficulty in traceability because of the number of intermediaries and cotton price fluctuation. Mr. Singh also stressed upon the social and environmental issues which are all interlinked. He also shared about some of the ways forward to address the sustainability issues like bringing sustainability and business together, creating circular products, ensuring zero wastage at all stages and keeping things local.
Mr. Singh advised the present batch to become masters in whichever sector they intend to work. He also suggested that they invest in learning new things, using technology, keeping one updated, building up knowledge and improving writing skill. Learning attitude, patience and good writing skill will help them grow in their profession.
Mr. Prabeen Kumar Singh is a Senior Manager, Cotton Connect South Asia Pvt Ltd. An agriculture graduate from Banaras Hindu University, Mr. Singh completed MBA in Rural Management from KIIT School of Rural Management in 2010. He also did a specialization course on leading people and teams from University of Michigan, certificate programme on Sustainable Fashion from Copenhagen Business School and Driving business through Sustainable Development Goal from Erasmus University Rotterdam. Mr. Singh joined Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (India) through campus placement and has worked with organizations like Ambuja Cement Foundation and Global Communities.