07 November 2022, Mumbai:
The Ministry of Commerce's underlying caveat of The draft policy is ensuring," Better ease of doing business aimed at achieving easy and quick access to affordable credit, facilitating retail trade attain modernization and digitization by fuelling the existing modern technology and laying foundational superior infrastructural backup besides other considerations.
The key aspiration/expectation persistently remains the demand in perpetuity of seeking a speedy rollout of India’s national retail trade policy with the underlying hypothesis of achieving a fair and square level-playing field for (SMBs) small sellers, providing them greater access to credit necessitated to get large, organized retailers/formal economy businesses faster approvals and demonstrability.
MD and CEO, of Metro Cash & Carry India and Chairperson, of Retail & Internal Trade Committee, FICCI at a very recently conducted Ficci show alluded to stress the point," As always our request to the government, through this platform, is to appreciate & recognize in the larger interest of trade expedite the adoption of this policy and formulation thus achieving the larger purpose of formalization of this policy taking into account all stakeholders. Stepping back to In December 2021, it was the Ministry of Commerce that had indicated to the delight of the trade stating, a draft National Retail Trade Policy has been prepared for smooth-running retail trade and development of all formats, e-commerce players, modern trade as well as small mom-pop stores across the industry. Further clarifying that although the officially official draft is ready, what is disappointing is the industry has little/no clarity at this juncture how smooth the passage of the policy/amenable is lined up and what is in store for the trade," he said speaking on the sidelines of the event,"
According to a CII 2020 and consulting company Kearney trade report," Outling that at the outset, India’s market for retail trade is broadly unorganized and what intricates the state of affairs is that a number of laws, compounded by state-level variations in implementation, in turn, compounding complexity for retailers, more particularly in the case of an endeavor of a nationwide footprint. Inevitably making it a business imperative for retailers aimed at warranting pre-requisition for holistic pan-India policy roll out exists for the smooth running of the businesses in our nation".
The article is a low-down on giving insights on the nuances of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade's (DPIIT) National retail trade policy proposed to formulate tasked with objectives that should address the state and central-level trade-related aspects aimed at promoting the growth of domestic trade resting on the principles of the larger purpose of aligning with the interest and aspirations of the trade through industry consultations.
Hope sustains life
The draft is aimed at improving ease of doing business, ensuring easy and quick access to affordable credit, facilitating modernization and digitization of retail trade by promoting modern technology and superior infrastructural support, development of physical infrastructure across the distribution chain of retail trade, promotion of skill development and improvement of labour productivity, creation of large scale employment opportunities, and providing an effective consultative and grievance redressal mechanism for the retail sector, for the welfare of traders and their employees. But it remains a draft.
What we can’t reverse is the retailers hoping for a fast rollout and a greater degree of consistency.
