Hi everyone, this is Rajna Panda speaking to you from Varanasi, India. India is a beautiful amalgamation of complexity, modernity, spirituality, innovation, technology and tradition. Today when I stand in Varanasi, I remember that it's one of the most beautiful, serene cities in the world. As I launch the next round of Bayer Talks from the city, it feels absolutely wonderful. Welcome to Bayer Talks and welcome to the talk which talks about leadership, science and impact.
Hi everyone. Today I have a very, very special person with me, somebody who inspires all of us at Bayer and somebody who's transforming Bayer in more than one ways. I have with me the CEO of Bayer, Mr. Bill Anderson. Welcome to India, Bill.
Hey, it's great to be here. Thanks for the opportunity.
Bill, you've traveled now across the world and in India you've gone to the different parts of Delhi, different parts of Agra, some parts of Varanasi today and you'll be in Bengaluru. You've met up with policy makers, farmers, women farmers, our pharma business people, consumer health business. How does it feel?
Well, to be honest, it's a bit overwhelming. I mean, the impact that India has for Bayer and that Bayer is having in India is really, it's very moving I have to say. You know, we have a company that is so focused on this mission, health for all, hunger for none, that comes alive here in a way that is impossible to exaggerate. You know, I was Saturday night in the town bazaar in Agra and seeing our products, for example, our consumer health products in the medical wholesalers there and they are basically making these available to tens of millions of people and just seeing how the business is done. But the conditions are very different. You know, these products have to be able to take temperatures up to the high 40s, you know, 45 Celsius. It's like 115 degrees Fahrenheit. And so this is a special, a very special country and some special demands.
In a country like India which is extremely populated, right, in fact we are the most populous country in the world. How do you see the vision of Health for All and Hunger for None, you know, coming to life, particularly when it comes to nutrition and health?
Well, nutrition, it's clear there are opportunities here to meet the coming needs. There's going to be 300 million more people in the next couple decades. And we have the opportunity to significantly increase the output of Indian farms and at the same time help the farmers to improve the quality of the soil because right now the soil's been depleted in many places and that can't continue. So what Bayer's doing in nutrition is invaluable. On the other hand, we have in the case of for example with climate change, more and more people especially in a country like India are exposed to these extreme temperatures. You know, a very small proportion of the population has air conditioning and if you have people who are, you know, living outdoors or living in the elements and the temperature keeps rising, this is really tough for things like kidneys, cardiovascular system. And we have the ability with medicines we're developing for heart and kidney to bring solutions that can help make people more resilient. So it's just those are just a couple examples out of many. And also we have the, you know, water depletion in the country.
Which is, and we have these climate resilient crops. You met a number of drone didis, the lady pilots for the drones. How does it feel? Have you seen that anywhere else in the world?
No. No. No. In fact, it's a little counterintuitive at first. You think, hm, drones, when you have small farms, why do you need drones? But you realize that they're not replacing, the drone's not replacing a tractor and a sprayer. The drone is replacing a person who's going to take a day to spray a pesticide in a 1-acre field. You can do this with a drone in 15 minutes. And the fact that we are training these women as drone operators and I got a chance to meet one of them. She's 21 years old and she's quite good. I got to see her in action. Right. They can cover a village. In other words, not every smallholder farmer needs a drone operator. One drone operator can cover many, many farms in a fraction of the time and most importantly prevent the exposure of the applicators to the pesticide, right, because they're not anywhere near the actual application so it's safer as well.
