Wednesday, 17 October 2012

FDI IN INDIAN RETAIL SECTOR

Retailing in India

Retailing in India is one of the pillars of its economy and accounts for 14 to 15% of its GDP. The Indian retail market is estimated to be US$ 450 billion and one of the top five retail markets in the world by economic value. India is one of the fastest growing retail markets in the world, with 1.2 billion people. India's retailing industry is essentially owner manned small shops. In 2010, larger format convenience stores and supermarkets accounted for about 4% of the industry, and these were present only in large urban centers. India's retail and logistics industry employs about 40 million Indians (3.3% of Indian population). Until 2011, Indian central government denied foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail, forbidding foreign groups from any ownership in supermarkets, convenience stores or any retail outlets. Even single-brand retail was limited to 51% ownership and a bureaucratic process. In November 2011, India's central government announced retail reforms for both multi-brand stores and single-brand stores. These market reforms paved the way for retail innovation and competition with multi-brand retailers such as Walmart, Carrefour and Tesco, as well single brand majors such as IKEA, Nike, and Apple. The announcement sparked intense activism, both in opposition and in support of the reforms. In December 2011, under pressure from the opposition, Indian government placed the retail reforms on hold till it reaches a consensus. In January 2012, India approved reforms for single-brand stores welcoming anyone in the world to innovate in Indian retail market with 100% ownership, but imposed the requirement that the single brand retailer source 30% of its goods from India. Indian government continues the hold on retail reforms for multi-brand stores. IKEA announced in January that it is putting on hold its plan to open stores in India because of the 30% requirement. Fitch believes that the 30% requirement is likely to significantly delay if not prevent most single brand majors from Europe, USA and Japan from opening stores and creating associated jobs in India. 

FDI Policy in India
FDI as defined as investment in a foreign country through the acquisition of a local company or the establishment there of an operation on a new site. To put in simple words, FDI refers to capital inflows from abroad that is invested in or to enhance the production capacity of the economy. Foreign Investment in India is governed by the FDI policy announced by the Government of India and the provision of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) 1999. The Reserve Bank of India in this regard had issued a notification, which contains the Foreign Exchange Management Regulations. This notification has been amended from time to time. The Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India is the nodal agency for motoring and reviewing the FDI policy on continued basis and changes in sectoral policy/ sectoral equity cap. The FDI policy is notified through Press Notes by the Secretariat for Industrial Assistance (SIA), Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP). The foreign investors are free to invest in India, except few sectors/activities, where prior approval from the RBI or Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) would be required.
FDI Policy with Regard to Retailing in India
It will be prudent to look into Press Note 4 of 2006 issued by DIPP and consolidated FDI Policy issued in October 2010[11] which provide the sector specific guidelines for FDI with regard to the conduct of trading activities. 
1. FDI up to 100% for cash and carry wholesale trading and export trading allowed under the automatic route.
2. FDI up to 51 % with prior Government approval for retail trade of Single Brand‘ products.
3. FDI is not permitted in Multi Brand Retailing in India. 

Prospected Changes in FDI Policy for Retail Sector in India 
The government (led by Dr.Manmohan Singh, announced following prospective reforms in Indian Retail Sector
1. India will allow FDI of up to 51% in ―multi-brand‖ sector.
2. Single brand retailers such as Apple and Ikea, can own 100% of their Indian stores, up from previous cap of 51%.
3. The retailers (both single and multi-brand) will have to source at least 30% of their goods from small and medium sized Indian suppliers.
4. All retail stores can open up their operations in population having over 1million.Out of approximately 7935 towns and cities in India, 55 suffice such criteria.
5. Multi-brand retailers must bring minimum investment of US$ 100 million. Half of this must be invested in back-end infrastructure facilities such as cold chains, refrigeration, transportation, packaging etc. to reduce post-harvest losses and provide remunerative prices to farmers.
6. The opening of retail competition (policy) will be within parameters of state laws and regulations.

FDI in Single-Brand Retail
FDI in ‗Single brand‘ retail implies that a retail store with foreign investment can only sell one brand. For example, if Adidas were to obtain permission to retail its flagship brand in India, those retail outlets could only sell products under the Adidas brand and not the Reebok brand, for which separate permission is required. If granted permission, Adidas could sell products under the Reebok brand in separate outlets.

FDI in Multi-Brand Retail
The government has also not defined the term Multi Brand. FDI in Multi Brand retail implies that a retail store with a foreign investment can sell multiple brands under one roof. In July 2010, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce circulated a discussion paper on allowing FDI in multi-brand retail. The paper doesn‘t suggest any upper limit on FDI in multi-brand retail. If implemented, it would open the doors for global retail giants to enter and establish their footprints on the retail landscape of India. Opening up FDI in multi-brand retail will mean that global retailers including Wal-Mart, Carrefour and Tesco can open stores offering a range of household items and grocery directly to consumers in the same way as the ubiquitous ‘kirana’ store.


Effects of FDI on various Stakeholders

1. Impact on Farming Communities
A supermarket revolution has been underway in developing countries since the early 1990s. Supermarkets (here referring to all modern retail, which includes chain stores of various formats such as supermarkets, hypermarkets, and convenience and neighbourhood stores) have now gone well beyond the initial upper- and middle-class clientele in many countries to reach the mass market. Within the food system, the effects of this trend touch not only traditional retailers, but also the wholesale, processing, and farm sectors. When supermarkets modernize their procurement systems, they require more from suppliers with respect to volume, consistency, quality, costs, and commercial practices. Supermarkets‘ impact on suppliers is biggest and earliest for food processing and food-manufacturing enterprises, given that some 80% of what supermarkets sell consists of processed, staple, or semi-processed products. But by affecting processors, supermarkets indirectly affect farmers, because processors tend to pass on the demands placed on them by their retail clients. Supermarket chains prefer, if they are able, to source from medium and large processing enterprises, which are usually better positioned than small enterprises to meet supermarkets‘ requirements. The rise of supermarkets thus poses an early challenge to processed food microenterprises in urban areas.
By contrast, as supermarkets modernize the procurement of fresh produce, they increasing source from farmers through ―specialized and dedicated wholesalers and occasionally throughtheir own collection centers. 
When farmers enter supermarket channels, they tend to earn from 20 to 50% more in net terms. Among tomato farmers in Indonesia, for example, net profit  is 33–39% higher among supermarket channel participants than among participants in traditional markets. Farm labour also gains. But supplying supermarket chains requires farmers to 

2. Impact on Traditional Mom and Pop Stores
The main question being raised is whether the traditional mom and pop stores will survive and co-exist or leave the field for major organized retail players? The answer could be a co-existence. The major advantage for the smaller players is the size, complexity and diversity of our Indian Markets. If we look at the organized retail players, most of them have opened shop in the Metros, Tier 1 and Tier 2 towns. Very rarely do we find organized players in the rural areas and we have more than 70% of the population living in the rural areas. There are a multitude of reasons being floated around to prevent the liberalization of the FDI norms for Indian retail: Primary among these is the concern regarding the kirana stores as well other locally operated Mom and Pop stores being adversely affected by the entry of global retail giants such as Walmart, Carrefour and Tesco. As these brands would come with advanced capabilities of scale and infrastructure in addition to having deep pockets, it is argued that this would result in the loss of jobs for lakhs of people absorbed in the unorganized sector. Fears have also been raised over the lowering of prices of products owing to better operational efficiencies of the organized players that would affect the profit margins of the unorganized players. Instability surrounding the political arena with a number of scams of varying magnitudes doing the rounds has also led to a sense of uncertainty among foreign investors. Many Industry experts though, feel that the reservations against the introduction of Multi-Brand retail are mostly misplaced. The successful deployment of 100% FDI in China is a case in point. Partial FDI in retail was introduced in 1992 in China. Subsequently, in December 2004, the Chinese retail market was fully opened up to utilise the enormous manpower and wide customer base available that has led to a rapid growth of the sector. Today, its retail sector is the second largest (in value) in the world with global retailers such as Walmart, 7-Eleven and Carrefour comprising 10% of the total merchandise.

Multi-brand retail, if allowed, is expected to transform the retail landscape in a significant way:
1. Firstly, the organised players would bring in the much needed investment that would spur the further growth of the sector. This would be particularly important for sustenance of some of the domestic retailers that don‘t have the resources to ride out the storm during an economic slump such as the case with Vishal, Subhiksha and Koutons, which couldn‘t arrange for funds to sustain their growth.
2. The technical know-how, global best practices, quality standards and cost competitiveness brought forth through FDI would augur well for the domestic players to garner the necessary support to sustain their growth.
3. Indian has also been crippled by rising inflation rates that have refused to come within accepted levels. A key reason for this has been attributed to the vastly avoidable supply chain costs in the Indian food and grocery sales which has been estimated to be a whopping US$ 24 Bn. The infrastructure support extended to improve the backend processes of the supply chain would enable to eliminate such wastages and enhance the operational efficiency.
4. FDI in multi-brand retail would in no way endanger the jobs of people employed in the unorganised retail sector. On the contrary, it would lead to the creation of millions of jobs as massive infrastructure capabilities would be needed to cater to the changing lifestyle needs of the urban Indian who is keen on allocating the disposable income towards organised retailing in addition to the local kirana stores. These stores would be able to retain their importance owing to their unique characteristics of convenience, proximity and skills in retaining customers. Also, these would be more prominent in the Tier-II and Tier-III cities where the organised supermarkets would find it harder to establish themselves.

Contrary to the above view
Traditional retailing has been established in India for many centuries, and is characterized by small, family-owned operations. Because of this, such businesses are usually very low-margin, are owneroperated,
and have mostly negligible real estate and labour costs. Moreover, they also pay little by way of taxes. Consumer familiarity that runs from generation to generation is one big advantage for the traditional retailing sector. It is often said that the mom-and-pop store in India is more like a father-and-son enterprise. Such small shops develop strong networks with local neighbourhoods. The informal system of credit adds to their attractiveness, with many houses running up a tab‘ with their neighbourhood kirana store, paying it off every fortnight or month. Moreover, low labour costs also allow shops to employ delivery boys, such that consumers may order their grocery list directly on the phone. These advantages are significant, though hard to quantify. In contrast, players in the organized sector have to cover big fixed costs, and yet have to keep prices low enough to be able to compete with the traditional sector. Getting customers to switch their purchasing away from small neighbourhood shops and towards large scale retailers may be a major challenge. The experience of large Indian retailers such as Big Bazaar shows that it is indeed possible. Anecdotal evidence of consumers who return from such shops suggests that the wholesale model provides for major bargains – something Indian consumers are always on the lookout for.
The other major challenge for retailers in India, as opposed to the US, is the storage setup of households. For the large-scale retail model to work, consumers visit such large stores and return with supplies likely to last them for a few weeks. Having such easy access to neighborhood stores with whom, as discussed above, it is possible to have a line of credit and easy delivery service, congested urban living conditions imply that few Indian households might be equipped with adequate storage facilities. In urban settings, real estate rents are also very high. Thus opportunities in this sector are limited to those retailers with deep pockets, and puts pressure on their margins. Conversely for retailers looking to set up large stores at a distance from residential neighborhoods may struggle to attract consumers away from their traditional sources of groceries and other products.

3. Impact on Consumers and existing Supermarkets
Supermarkets tend to charge consumers lower prices and offer more diverse products and higher quality than traditional retailers—these competitive advantages allow them to spread quickly, winning consumer market share. In most countries supermarkets offer lower prices first in the processed and semiprocessed
food segments. Only recently, mainly in the first- and second-wave countries have supermarket prices for fresh fruits and vegetables been lower than traditional retailers‘ (except in India). The food price savings accrue first to the middle class, but as supermarkets spread into the food markets of the urban poor and into rural towns, they have positive food security impacts on poor consumers. For example, in Delhi, India, the basic foods of the urban poor are cheaper in supermarkets than in traditional retail shops: rice and wheat are 15% cheaper and vegetables are 33% cheaper.

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