India is the world’s fifth-largest global destination in the retail space. The commerce and industry ministry along with the department of financial services is also working on framing an insurance scheme for all the GST-registered retail traders.
The government is preparing a national retail trade policy to provide brick-and-mortar shops with a business-friendly environment, modern infrastructure facilities and easy access to credit, the joint secretary in the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), a senior official said on March 6.
The policy aims to provide a globally competitive and sustainable environment for the overall development of the retail trade. The department is also preparing an insurance scheme for all the retail traders. The accident insurance scheme would help small traders. The main objective of the draft national retail trade policy is the facilitation of the modernisation and digitisation of retail trade plus streamlining retail trade and development in all formats. The policy is likely to include provisions related to ensuring easy and quick access to affordable credit, facilitating modernization and digitisation of retail trade; modern infrastructural support for subjects like distribution chain; promotion of skill development and improving labour productivity, and providing an effective consultative and grievance redressal mechanism.
The Joint Secretary in the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) Sanjiv urged the industry to focus on producing high quality products. An interesting facet of the proposed new policy is the focus on traders’ welfare. Besides specifying accident insurance, the draft covers pension schemes for traders, self-employed persons and shopkeepers. It has also proposed a national traders’ welfare board.
” We want that there should be a synergy between e-commerce as well as retail traders. The government is trying to do policy changes not only in e-commerce but national retail trade policy which will be for physical traders which will be introducing ease of doing business, providing better infrastructural facilities, providing more credit and providing all sorts of benefits to traders,” Sanjiv said at a conference on FMCG and e-commerce.
He also said the Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) initiative of the government would change the entire ecosystem of e-commerce and break the hegemony of the e-commerce giants. The Indian retail market is one of the fastest growing in the world and is expected to reach $2 trillion by 2032, according to Reliance Retail director Subramaniam V. The market is estimated at $844 billion in 2022 with the unorganised sector contributing around 87 per cent.
Subramaniam also said the unorganised segment is highly fragmented and lacks modern-day infrastructure and technology due to smaller volume and financial resources. There was a need to build an operating environment which promoted inclusive and sustainable growth for the sector.
Under the proposed policy, a single window clearance mechanism for traders may be developed, besides a centralised and computerized inspection management system.
