National Retail Trade Policy

In News

  • Recently, The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) has sought the views of 16 departments and ministries on its draft national retail trade policy.
    • It is aimed at the overall development of all formats of the sector.

About National Retail Trade Policy

  • Data: 
    • India is the world’s fifth-largest global destination in the retail space.
  • Body: 
    • The policy has been envisioned by DPIIT to formulate the national retail policy to promote the growth of domestic trade.
  • Aim:
    • It focuses on formulating strategies to provide a globally competitive and sustainable environment for overall development of retail trade through targeted efforts.
  • The objectives of the policy includes:
    • 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.
    • Promotion of skill development and to improve labour productivity.
    • Providing an effective consultative and grievance redressal mechanism for the sector. 

Major Challenges in this sector

  • Unorganised market: 
    • India’s market for retail trade is largely unorganised.
  • High complexities
    • A number of laws, compounded by state-level variations in implementation, create immense complexity for retailers, especially those with a pan-Indian footprint. 
    • This makes it imperative for retailers to ensure a comprehensive pan-India policy is in place.
  • Long procedures
    • If we want to set up a store in organized retail, we probably need approvals from 40 different authorities. 
    • There could be a single window clearance.
    • States like Telangana have actually adopted it but it needs to be adopted across the country. 

Significance of the policy 

  • Promote ease of doing business
    • This policy will streamline the retail trade and promote ease of doing business in the retail trade sector. 
  • E-commerce
    • It will promote e-commerce all over the country.
  • Employment generation
    • It will leverage retail trade as a tool for socio-economic development of the country.
    • A cohesive national retail policy can help generate 30 lakh more jobs by 2024. 
  • Skill development: 
    • It will encourage skill development and create more employment opportunities for all sections of society involved in retail trade.
  • Infrastructure: 
    • It will identify and address existing infrastructure gaps affecting the retail trade industry.
  • Investments
    • It will accelerate investment flow to underdeveloped regions across the country.
    • The retail industry is likely to see 10 per cent annual growth to reach about USD 2 trillion by 2032
  • Beneficial to all sellers
    • It will bring about a level-playing field for small sellers by providing them access to credit as well as help large, organized retailers with quicker approvals.
  • Women empowerment:
    • The retail industry is one of India’s largest employers of women which comprise around 25-30 percent of the total workforce.

Way Forward

  • DPIIT is also working on formulating a national e-commerce policy to promote the growth of the online retail sector in the country.
  • A new industrial policy is also on the pipeline which will be the third industrial policy after the first in 1956 and the second in 1991. 
  • A cohesive retail policy built on the pillars of simplification, standardization, and digitalization will pave the way for significant growth and accelerate a short-term economic recovery

Source: BS

 
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