MEASURES
TO FIX EXISTING PERILS AMONG VARIOUS SECTIONS OF PEOPLE REGARDING
“FDI IN RETAIL”
***
NEED
FOR FDI IN AGRICULTURE SECTOR FOR INPUT SUPPLIES, BACK END INFRASTRUCTURE
CREATION
***
MEASURES FOR
ACHIEVING GROWTH, DEVELOPMENT IN FUTURE “WITHOUT
FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT”
INTRODUCTION
Since Government of India is currently
moving towards organized retail expansion, especially in the food and grocery
segments which account for nearly 60 percent of total retail sales in India, which
have been growing at annual rates between 16 and 50 percent over the past few years.
Also the reports of surveys of “Planet Retail” 2008, shows that the top 10
Indian organized food and grocery retailers grew at the rate of 72.4 percent
from 2002 to 2007, it is mainly due to the patronages of the urban people,
especially the working class population as the multi brand retailers provide
the graded and cleaned, ready for use food grains and groceries where the urban
working class need not required to spend time in segregating in selecting the groceries,
also in preparation which saves lot of their effort, time. Since food and
grocery sales by organized sector firms account for only around 10 percent of
total organized sector retail sales, clearly indicating that there is ample
scope for scaling up of organized food and grocery retailing. The high growth
rate of the top players in India’s organized food and grocery segment suggests
that this sector will occupy a growing share of both the food and grocery market
and the overall retail market in India. As such government opening up of FDI in
retail is fully justifiable for creation of more facilities for the consumers,
more storage facilities for the farm produce reducing the wastage, however
government needs to induce and incorporate
stringent protective laws as far as FDI retail is concerned, in the
event that India is law abiding country which once made a policy will not
revert it in future, as such there should be initial safe guards should be incorporated
in the system to protect the interest of the farmers from the possible
exploitation by the giant retailers and the exploitation of labour by the giant
retailers , the interest of the small traders from being forced closure due to
competition in pricing, the interest of the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
(MSME) which are in food processing (which account over 3 million in number of
units with a turnover of over 250 billion rupees) and ultimately the interest
of the majority of the consumers who are common man i.e “amm admi” and also for
the government most important is the taxes on the revenues earned by these
multi brand giant retailers to be collected in India only.
MEASURES TO FIX EXISTING PERILS AMONG
VARIOUS SECTIONS OF PEOPLE REGARDING FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT IN RETAIL SECTOR
IN A WIN-WIN STRATEGY FOR THE PEOPLE AS WELL AS THE INVESTOR
The statistics shows that the retail trade
in organized sector is only 10 % of the total retail sale of around Rs 24 lack
cores per annum in India; where as in food and groceries as of now around 95 %
retail is un organised and only 5 % is in organised sector which is growing at
70 % per annum in turnover as far as top 10 individual multi brand retail is
concerned in five years clearly indicates that the stores are patronized by the
urban people especially the working class; the projection of organised multi
brand retail sale is expected at around 15 % in a decade which clearly
indicates that in a decade over 10% of the small traders are going to closure;
but there may be an employment loss is several time the employment generation
due to the organized retail sale which was mostly mechanised ( use silo bins
for storage, cold storages, as such employment generation through back end
infrastructure which may generate over 2% or little more as the workers of the
construction company may have work during the construction only) the employment
generated at present by the unorganised retail is around 4.5 crores, in the
event as per government projections that organised retail may take maximum 15 %
of the total retail in 10 years which means there is a loss of employment to 45
lack people in ten years mostly i.e yearly
near about 4.5 lack jobs who are semi skilled people maintaining the
accounts, small labour job as helpers (not hamalies / like daily wage labour
engaged in the MNREGA works – these employees of retail cannot do hard labour?);
apart from the loss of direct employment where these employees who are tuned to
the labour of the kirana retail cannot be suitable for other labour jobs; the
answer is government has to adjust these workers/ employees of un organised
retail through the construction of godowans/ silo bins for storage of the farm
produce in the villages/mandals is the only solution, for which again huge
invest is required as such government must make FDI’s in the Agriculture sector
for back end infrastructure creation as per the government plan for
establishing the “rural warehousing” in a more sophisticated manner (as
mentioned in my document “Food for All”); Also since the purchase power,
storage capacity and holding for long power is vested with the multi brand
retail they may do a turnover of 1:50 i.e for every Rs 1 investment may do a
turnover of Rs 50 per annum which may be much bigger than the estimates in 10
years by few players; many people has the biggest peril that the farmers and
the traders got effected badly, equally the consumers over a period of time as
such these issues need to be addressed; As discussed in my previous document
titled “Suggestions for Achieving ‘Food For All’...” regarding the ideal &
advantageous for all that government itself should be procuring the entire
agriculture produce in the larger interest of farmers and people by completely
banning the contract banning and the middle men in the system (as was
intended/expecting by government the retail giant stores eliminate middlemen
exploitation - as such the same advantage should be made to the all the farmers
from the exploitation by the middlemen as well as the retail giant stores; also
if as per the government the organised retail mainly benefits in collection of
sales tax, but in the event if government procure the entire produce and put it
to the market there is no chance of single rupee tax escape as government can
collect the tax at the source while selling to the traders before it reaches
the retailers in the market itself which means all the retail is organised as
far as the tax angle is concerned; apart from this fixing minimum and maximum
sale of the products will ensure that almost the entire retail is organised as
far as food grains and groceries is concerned except the difference of
cleaning, sewing etc which is done by the multi brand retail stores, of course
now a day’s most of the small traders i.e “kirana stores” also doing the
cleaning and sieving before selling; still urban population is patronizing the
modern multi brand retail system the same should be continued only in addition
to government following the procurement & marketing of the entire
agriculture produce along with minimum maximum sale creteria), since the retail
stores can occupy a maximum of 10% to 15 % of the total volume of the retail
sector over a decade which many not take care of the need of not more than 25% of the farmers and their
produce including their buffer stock in their individual storage godowans so
the rest of 75 % farmers will certainly get exploited by middlemen as well as
the price war from the retail giant stores during the tough times by release of
buffer stock in the possession of the retail giant stores bring the stock at
old prices do killing in the market) at minimum procurement price (which should
be fixed based on the local conditions and local inputs costs in that
village/mandal) from the farmers with providing a minimum of 20 % profit for
the farmers and fixing the price for the traders and the retailers, in order to
ensure fair trade practices the government must fix the minimum sale price for
all the commodities in addition to fixing of maximum sale price. As otherwise since
the fixing of the maximum sale price is based on the minimum support price paid
to the farmer which is dependent up on the local conditions, the prices of the
commodities may vary from place to place. In this connection the traders may
procure in bulk from the other places or may sell adulterated food grains. To
prevent all these and make fair competition among the traders and retailers at
all the places the minimum sale price should be fixed in addition to the
maximum price. To ensure all traders will sell at minimum sale price and not
exceeding the maximum sale price all the traders and the all retailers should
mandatorily maintain the electronic billing system for the sale of non
processed raw agriculture products from kirana stores to hyper markets.
This system will ensure fair trade
practices even in supermarkets and other hypermarkets. Also this will certainly
eliminate the fears of many people as far as the retail food cost is concerned
(as many fear that multi brand retail giants will procure the materials from
the low cost production countries like Thailand, Indonesia, Cambodia, Vietnam
etc and import food products in bulk and sell it at cheaper price than the
agriculture raw output of India, killing many small retailers and many
agriculture producers) in the light of FDI in retail allowing the multi brand
giant retail chains in India. As such in order to prevent any such occurrences
in future, it will be more ideal that government should make it mandatory that
all the multi brand retail stores should procure at least 3/4 of the total agriculture
produce sold (both raw agriculture produce as well as processed foods) in the
stores (in terms of quantity as well as in terms of value of the products sale)
should be procured from the Indian agriculture produce as long as they operate
the store in Indian Territory, in addition the multi brand giant retail stores
should sell 100 % sale of the agriculture raw produce (like rice, wheat,
cereals, vegetables and fruits) at the minimum sale price fixed by the the
government for the respective commodities as per the area, as government fixes
different rates for different areas of sale based on the local conditions (the
cost of agriculture inputs, the climatic conditions). Also all these giant
multi brand retail stores should mandatorily sale within the maximum price
fixed by the government for the raw agriculture produce (even though they do
the cleaning, sieving packing etc of the raw agriculture produce, which may
lose certain quantity as waste). This will certainly protect the sale of the
agriculture produce as majority of the consumers are in the urban and semi
urban areas as many middle class and upper class people live in these areas
with more purchase power as they certainly possess more per capta income compared
to the rural areas.
Since the prices of the commodities for
sale are fixed for minim sale price this will certainly force all the multi
brand retailer giants procure the raw agriculture procure locally, otherwise
there may be a danger of the damage to small retailers as they cannot compete
with them due to less holding capacity and the prices are naturally slightly
higher than the multi brand retail, of course these price competition can be
minimized only through minimum sale price protection (even though it is a fact
that majority of the small “kirana stores are surviving and can survive to some
extent mainly due to the credit facility provided by them to the purchasers, as
majority of them are established for years in the same locality and majority of
the purchasers are purchasing from the same kirana stores for several years,
but still every individual purchaser look to save the money when it comes much
cheaper at some other place like in the multi brand retail giant stores, as
such it is very necessary to fix the minimum sale price of all the raw
agriculture produce to protect the interest of many sections). Also this is
necessary to protect the interest of the Indian farmers as well as the Indian
small retailers.(the best & ideal example to understand the sensitivity of
the issue is comparing with telecom sector which also involves crores of people
as India has over 85 crore mobile connections; Even though it is very hard to
digest but it is a fact that the some private telecom players literally made the
BSNL got killed it self, which is once the profit making prestigious organisation
of India in Telecom and government, but the FDI in the telecom literally got
sick the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), as
the government PSU could not able to compete with them (even though
excellent technological & engineering capabilities and supporting staff) in
expanding the markets by pumping in the huge investments in the sector as was
done by the private players who are competitive till they totally penetrated
into the markets, this made once having a profit of over Rs 10,000 crores was
now in a stage of closure of the organisation with over Rs 13,000 crores loss
just in less than a decade, this may certainly repeat in the FDI retail if
stringent safe guard laws are not framed (as if a profit making giant
organisation reached the level of closure in less than a decade one can imagine
the tiny retailers position after over a decade?), even though the FDI in
retail is a positive move in bring the standards in many areas such as by
constructing more storage facilities, more processing units over a period of
time (presuming an investment of 4 billion in FDI retail in 10 years, with
government present mandatory condition of 50 % of investment in back end
infrastructure creation which means 2 billion
which can create sizable infrastructure, but the infrastructure will be for specific
use of the investor alone for their own fullest advantage, not certainly for
the use of the general purpose storage use by the government. (This FDI in
retail will certainly benefit in
creation of jobs both directly and indirectly and little turnover for the
construction companies and filling the ideal constructed spaces in the cities
and large towns which are ideal due to slum in real estate due to meltdown of
global financial markets, but it will be total advantage for the Multi brand
Retail Giant’s as there is every possibility they will construct the cold
storages and storage godowans in the areas near to where mass agriculture production
takes place, they procure the material at very cheap rate the entire quantities
in that area and store for long and and sell it far less than the actual
produce price after some months which will kill the small farmers and traders
due to acute loses due to no market for their genuine sale. example when the
bumper crop arrives due to good monsoon the tomato farmers are selling tomato
at mere 20 pisa i.e Rs 0.20 per Kg, these multi brand retailers will construct
cold storages in areas little far away from these districts where bumper crop
arrives and procure the material store it for months as they have large holding
capacity both financially as well as storage space, they will sell the material
far cheaper than the market price after some months which will be some
advantage for the consumers but a great loss to the farmers, as after few
months due to weathering conditions the tomato will be sold by the same farmers
at Rs 20 per Kg due to the production cost to him may touches over Rs 18 on an
average, then the multi brand retailers who got cold storages and who procured
from the farmers at 20 pisa per kg during the bumper crop season add transport
and storage cost together Rs 3 and may sell tomato at Rs 10 per kg, which means
the other farmers will lose the money of Rs 15 per Kg, and many other traders/retailers
will acute face loss, as when such a dead cheap it is available people will buy
from the multi brand retail stores only coming from faraway places, while the
multi brand retailers earn a profit of Rs 7 on kg of tomato for having the
holding capacity and storage capacity, the case is same for other commodities
also. This can be avoided if and only if there exists a minimum and maximum sale
price fixed by the government, in addition government only should procure the
entire produce and supply to the farmers- completely banning the contract
farming and direct purchase of raw agriculture produce from the farmers or the
intermediateries, but once the government makes the mandatory minimum
procurement price and fixes the minimum retail sale price and maximum retail
price – by the government condition of 50 % of the investment in the back end
i.e storage transport etc by the construction of cold storages by the multi
brand retail giant stores will be great advantages to the farmers, by getting
fair price for them in the event of bumper crop, at the same time great
advantage for the consumers as most of the times the commodities are available
at prices fixed by the government). Also the government procuring from the
farmers the entire produce and marketing will have enormous advantages, as
there will not be uniform output of agriculture at all places, in this
situation government procurement will help in distributing to other places
where there is shortfall of agriculture output to balance the pricing almost
the same throughout the country, (like whenever there is short fall of
electricity government procuring the
current from other states and ensuring the availability of the power)
Also even though FDI in retail may
certainly create a sizable job opportunities both directly as well as
indirectly through back end infrastructure, but there exists every danger of
exploitation of labour by these multi brand retail as studies conducted by
various international organisations at the developing nations where the FDI in
retail was opened up clearly indicate that there was exploitation of the labour
by the multi brand retail giants by paying less and extracting more from the
workers, as such government must fix minimum salaries and maximum working hours
per day/week for working in the multi
brand retail stores, in addition government must ensure that that all labour
laws will be applicable to all people working in the multi brand retail giant
stores, allowing the formation of labour union in each FDI-Multi brand retail
giant stores, also government must ensure that minimum of 90 % of the unskilled
& semi skilled work force should be mandatorily Indian origin citizens of
India, also at least 75 % of the skilled workforce should be Indian origin
citizens of India.), Also all the employees should be employed only on
permanent bases and certainly not on the contract bases; in addition the
government must ensure that all the employees of the multi brand retail giant
stores should provide health care for the employees and their families either
through providing health insurance cared or by construction of super speciality
hospitals in the nearby vicinity where maximum employees living area to provide
health care for the individual employees as well as the family members of the
employee.
Also there is danger that multi brand foreign
retails act by bringing raw food/ food products imported in bulk, especially
the cheap processed food which do not have Indian FDA certification may have a
negative impact on the youth as youth are mostly attracted to the foreign foods,
with danger of every possibility to get addicted to those foods, as there
exists a danger that these imported food products may be like the terminator
seeds of agriculture promoted by the foreign companies i.e the GM/GE
genetically modified seeds which will have the long term impact on the
fertility of the soil once they are seeded and the crop is raised, there is no
other alternative that only the GM/GE seeds should be able to be cultivated
(forcibly) otherwise the once fertile land will remain as barren wasteland, as
the GE/GM seeds infuse the killer characteristics into the soil soon after the
yielding of the crop before dying, to destroy the fertility and make the soil
tune only to the GM/GE seeds in future, likewise these imported food products will ruin the
metabolic system of Indian people as over a period of time they completely need
to depend on these imported foods only discarding our traditional Indian foods,
as such government must make a policy to ensure that each and every food
product either raw or processed which was imported or manufactured outside
India should certainly get tested and get approval for each and every batch of
the each product by the Indian FDA , in addition the government should
mandatorily ensure the sale price of manufactured foods are also fit into the
minimum and maximum sale price criteria by making that all manufacturing
procedures of same nature for producing similar products will have the minimum
and maximum sale price (whether manufactured in India or abroad if product and
procedure of manufacture same) otherwise over a period of time India will
become the dumping yard of foreign un-standard & un healthy foods resulting
in not only killing the traditional foods but also there is every possibility
of health hazards of different natures (the majority of the children and youth
in the western countries who are being addicted to the junk foods like pizzas
and burgers and others foods, are suffering from obesity and many other health
complications as majority of the junk foods are manufactured from the
agriculture produce of the GE/GM seeds and crops, almost the same is happing in
urban India as even though there exits over 1/3 of the children are underweight
in India due under nutrition, surprisingly there is an alarmingly high, over
11% of the children are suffering with obesity due to over nutrition, majority
of them are urban middle class and high income group mainly due to addicted to the
junk foods, so there is every danger that the sub standard foreign foods create
an addiction in the children and youth which may have long term impact in the
absence of stringent Indian FDA laws to test, allow foreign processed foods,)
Also government should has the advantage of
more tax collection like import customs tax on the food materials and the sales
tax through the FDI in retail, but government must adopt strict vigilance and
appropriate other measures to curtail the since there exists every possibility
of inflating the shipping bills and reducing the margins, Also government must
ensure that the profits earned by the Multi brand retail stores should be fully
taxed in India only; which is possible if and only if there exists a double
taxation agreement with the countries where the FDI in retail is coming from,
since the multi brand retail stores if invested Rs 1 they will do a turnover of
Rs 100 per annum in the realistic terms government expecting an investment of 3
to 4 billion dollars in a decade by the time they will do a turnover of over
400 billion dollars, as such the taxation matter is very important as such
government must ensure taking up all measures which makes mandatory condition
the profit earned in Indian Soil by the multi brand retail stores should be
taxed in India only, as there exists over 51 % of the share by the foreign
companies.)
Also government must formulate
stringent laws in regards to the welfare
of the employees, in regarding the FDA approvals for imported processed food,
in regarding to taxation otherwise like the private telecom players provided
much needed expansion of the services to common man which is appreciable, but at the same time the private operators are
literally acting at their own whims & fancies even thought there exits
Hon’ble Supreme Court of India made the mandatory bar of the un-wanted
promotional calls, none of the private telecom operators followed even there
are repeated requests by the individual customers, in addition at the same time most of the
private operators are literally
squeezing the money of the many millions of innocent customers with forced&
un known to the customers offerings of unwanted offers of like caller tunes,
film news, astrology, chatting, dating, etc deducting the money from the
individual pre paid account holders without their knowledge in small amounts
ranging from 10 Rs to 50 Rs with at least they are squeezing not less than 50
Rs on average from the customers per month in addition to earning of regular
profits (this additional income of all the private operators touches as high as
over Rs 1 billion per month (near about Rs 5,500 crores per month which is
around Rs 63,000 crores per annum), as near about 83 crors mobile connections
exist in India, every individuals cannot go several times to the operators
local offices or the consumer forums and the courts for this amount as they
have to waste valuable time energy on this, of course they will win the case),
the same kind of extortion in appropriate different manner may happen in the
multi brand giant retail stores in case
proper systems are not places at the initial stages with non application of
stringent implementation of laws, Also even though the private telecom
operators knew the consequences of radiation emission from the cell towers
causing serious health hazards they did not bother to follow the rules as was
followed in the western countries and installed high power cell towers
everywhere to save money with a single motto to earn profit and recover very
speedy the investment at the earliest (instead of keeping many smaller
frequency towers as operation costs will increase in case of more number of
towers which reduces the profits marginally) as of now most of the private
telecom operators are acting more or less like the media (even though TRAI
telecom regulatory authority of India has full control over them), presuming
that they only have to frame the self regulations, this kind of situation may
arise in the case of multi brand giant retail stores, as they are big and
mighty and can influence any section of governance in India as always the same
government may not exists, unlike China which ever government in power the same
communist principles will be applicable with stringent implementation of laws
and stringent punishments, also the case is same with other western countries
where the law implementation is stringent and the culprits are brought to
justice very quickly, but the case is not the same is India being a socialist
democratic country, mostly run by collation governments till next few terms, laws implementation are
not so stringent as compared to other countries of course the laws are very
stringent in most of the areas, also there is certainly time taking activity as
far as bring the culprits to justice, best example the Bhopal gas incidence)
As FDI in retail is will hold to be a good
move of the government, if and only if government fixing the minimum sale price
and maximum sale price can ensure that fair trade practices occur in India at
all times coupled with mandatory Indian FDA approval for each batch of each
imported processed food sale in India as mandatory pre condition to sale in
India to protect the interest of farmers, small retailers, people of Indian
from having healthier,good foods all time.
Also once announced FDI in retail going
back will lead to downgrade of the image of India in the foreign countries as
well as downgrade the confidence of the
global investors in other FDI sectors, as such the FDI in retail should be
continued with stringent protection laws incorporate with appropriate checks
and balances fulfilling the larger dream of the UPA to really benefit the
people of the nation through reduction in the prices through bringing fair
competition without any scope for foul play, and also creation of more
employment opportunities with all safe guards for the employees with the entire
tax on the sale should be collected in India only for better revenue generation
as compared to unorganised retailing in which maximum scope for zero billing trade.
Also it is a fact that capitalists are
ruthless people as majority of the capitalists follow the universal principal
that they should earn more money at any cost, even at the cost of their own
life, adopting the principle of live in money, eat money die in earning money
only, they feel capital has no colour, no smell, no morals, no values, no
sentiments and no religion. As such Congress party who always vouches and
advocates for the welfare, betterment of common people, down trodden, always
following the path of the “Father of the Nation Mahatma Gandhi Ji” should need
to advocate & vouch for welfareisim and social justice, social equality for
all, has to take up this issue at this initial stage for the larger benefit of
the people of the country as well as party for framing, incorporating stringent
laws in the FDI retail system. Otherwise there every danger of rise in the
unrest of the people (which is like a massive wild fire in the light of these
social movements just based on the government reports on corruption, but if it
really touches their lives by cutting
the food in their plate directly due to government policy over a period of time
the unrest will certainly un stoppable), which may be also be capitalised by
the naxalisim, and the country may turn into another countries of middle east,
but unlike middle east countries controlling the unrest in India is really a
tough task, almost is next to impossible, due the size of population in our
country. As such it is more ideal and appropriate for the for the UPA
government under congress leadership should take appropriate necessary steps to
safe guard the interests of various sections of people while allowing the FDI
in Retail.
NEED FOR PRIVATE INVESTMENT; INCLUDING FDI IN
AGRICULTURE SECTOR
FOR
PROVIDING CHEAPER INPUTS LIKE WATER, FERTILIZERS AND LARGER STORAGE FACILITIES
GODOWNS FOR FERTILIZERS, SILO BINS FOR STORAGE OF FOOD GRAINS, COLD STORAGES
FOR STORAGE OF VEGETABLES AND FRUITS- APART FROM FDI IN RETAIL WHICH HAS LIMITED
TO THEIR INDIVIDUAL ORGANISATIONAL USE & BENEFIT
As we all knew that there exists a huge gap
in the agriculture output and the storage capacity, processing capacity and
also the inputs supply is not on par with the demand, as a result there is huge
loss to the agriculture output it is as high as over 30 % of the agriculture
produce is getting wasted and getting rotten without having the scope for use
due to lack of storage facility and being exposed to atmosphere with draining
in rains and cold winters making them to get rotten due to bacterial and fungal
formation and many fruits and vegetables are rotten during the excessive crop
yield due to lack of cold storages to enhance the shelf life and also lack of
food processing industries in the vicinity of the massive cropping areas, all
these leading to short supply in the food grains and vegetables leading to high
costs for the consumers; all these indicates huge
investments required to create the infrastructure for the agriculture sector like
the storage godwans for fertilizers, storage godowans for food grains, silo
storage bins (modern storage godowans), cold storages, rail sidings for the godowans,
market yards, etc. Since the government allowed the FDI in retail with
mandatory condition that 50 % of the investment should be on the back end
infrastructure creation by the multi brand giant retail stores, which will
serve their individual company purpose only. Otherwise the government’s claim
of the FDI in retail will serve the saving of 30 % of the wastage of food
products will be a disastrous to the entire small and marginal farmers as well
as small traders with such a huge holding capacity by the private giants will
do killing of the small traders and farmers as per the government claim that
the multi brand retail giant stores occupy only a maximum of 6 to 15 % of the
total trade in 10 years from now (as of now 6 % of the retail trade is
organised and rest 94 % is semi organised and un organised sector), if 6 % of
the retail traders holds near about 30 % of the total produce (the wastage
which is happening as of now due to lack of godowns), then they will undoubtedly
do killing of small farmers and small trades by playing ruthless cost gambling
in the procurement procuring the agriculture produce at cut-throat prices as
well as in retail sale by selling their produce are no where mach to even the
procurement cost of the whole sale traders leaving alone the retailer traders
and the margins and the cost of transport of the wholesaler as well as retailer
as and when appears to be profitable to them - happen or not- can be left to
individuals wisdom? As such it is not
true that the entire investment of the multi brand retailers is not sufficient
to cater the needs of the storage except storage for their personal company
needs, which may account for only less than 10 % of the total agriculture
produce (still can play a vital role in price game as such government must safe
guard the interest of the small and marginal farmers as well as the small
traders by fixing the minimum support price for procurement by government,
banning direct sale by farmers and banning contract farming for retailing, and
also fixing the minimum and maximum sale price for the agriculture raw produce
sale), the idea of having more modern storage facilities is to reduce the food
prices by making more availability in the market by reducing the wastage due to
lack of storage of the agriculture produce, as of now the annual agriculture
produce in India is over 350 million metric tonnes but surprisingly India has
only about 110 million metric tonnes of storage godowns with private godowns
account for only 15 million metric tonnes. As such the government must urgently
open up the FDI in agriculture sector for the creation of the back end
infrastructure is concerned only. Also the government must allow only 49 % FDI
in agriculture sector for providing the agriculture inputs like the, water for
cultivation through irrigation projects, through cloud seeding, through solar
power operated bore wells and power generation in agriculture fields through
wind energy etc, fertilizers (both chemical and bio), bio pesticides etc
require huge investments to produce and supply to the farmers. To make
everything by the government investment as per the existing demand is next to
impossible to achieve in the at least next few decades; the only alternative is
to bring huge private investment, but it is not possible to bring such a huge
investments by Indian private investors, as such government must open up these
areas in the agriculture sector to foreign direct investment (FDI) up to 49 %
only to ensure that Indian partner has more say; since there will not be any
risk to the foreign investors in the agriculture sector once the government
makes it a policy that all agriculture inputs and outputs are routed through
government and government supplies the inputs by payment guarantees from the
government and the output is procured by the government from the farmers, as
such the government mandatorily store in
the storage facility, this will ensure that the payments for the storage is
paid by the governments.
Also as far as the cloud seeding for water
supply is concerned payments should be as per the total rain water collected,
also the FDI in weather modification (cloud seeding) is more possible the
ground was already prepared by government indirectly; since the governments has
made a great move of allowing 49 % FDI in the “aviation sector” which will
boost the investors towards cloud seeding if government opens the FDI in this
sector, since the cloud seeding is mainly dependent on airplanes spilling the
chemicals in the clouds to covert the moisture in the cloud to become water
droplets and fall as rain water. Also
similarly the ground water lifting through solar powered motors with payment on
the bases of quantity of water dispensed will certainly the FDI as government
is paying for the water. Also as far as the storage godowans for food grains is
concerned the Silo bins which are the most most modern, efficient and effective
way of storing food grains minimizing the wastages due to pests, insects, and
wastage in the handling and saving lot of fumigants and the gunni bags and can
be stored for longer period; the payments are guaranteed for the investors as
stock of the total agriculture produce is procured by the government from the
Village Agriculture Co-operative Associations from all the farmers, making it
the government responsibility for storage of the agriculture produce; the case
is same with regards to the cold storages for storing the fruits and
vegetables. All these measures lead to more supply of food grains, fruits &
vegetables in the market which can make the prices stable at all times.
As such the FDI in agriculture sector will
certainly boost the economy and economic growth are will certainly be in double
digits; which means more jobs, better lively hood for the people in India.
MEASURES
FOR ACHIEVING GROWTH, DEVELOPMENT IN FUTURE “WITHOUT FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT”
In fact FDI is required for India for few
years only; as once government takes appropriate measures making mandatorily
all sections of the people behave with responsibility especially the political
class, the bureaucratic class and the business class people by making the
family trees of the political leaders , ex-political leaders both sitting/non sitting elected
representatives from village panchayat to parliament and ward leaders to
national leaders cutting across party lines, their assets, their bank accounts,
their investments by obtaining the self declaration under the affidavit;
similarly the bureaucrats from the local government to central government, and
the business establishments all companies as per individual share holders,
partnership firms as per partners, all the HUF business establishments, all
propriety business establishments; all data should be correlated and segregated
and stored as per the PAN card number, Voter Id card number; in addition
ensuring the banks should re register on
bio metric bases of all the active accounts, apart from the new accounts
both savings and current accounts, and
integrate the core banking data of all the banks, which will eliminate all
factious accounts (need to take stringent severe punishments for accounts with
same finger prints in different names or withdraw of money from other accounts
on hearing this notification of re registration of accounts through bio metric
finger prints as it is the duty of the branch manager soon on the notification
by government must collect the biometric finger print of the account holder,
freezing the online transfer till the account is biometrically activate –
mandatory affidavit with digital photo of the depositor in the bank counter by
individuals depositing money more than Rs 10,000 cash in any account regarding
the source of income, in addition restriction of cash withdraw limit to Rs
10,000, all transactions either through online or cheque only and mandatory all
the bills like electricity, water bill, petrol bill, municipal tax, telephone
bill, internet bill, maintenance bill, house rent, income tax etc should be
through cheque payment only; in addition all purchases above Rs 10,000 should
be through bank card only; all air ticket purchases through bank card in the
airline counter, through bankers check payment through the travel agent; all
the bullion above Rs 5,000 through bank card or check) will provide money
sufficient enough for all the infrastructure development activates without any
requirement for FDI; in addition government making it mandatory that all the
investments made in the business to be provided with affidavit for the source
of income; with all sorts of affidavits filled by the individuals are legally
binding, with stringent punishments for the wrong information in the affidavit;
in addition governments should able to get the tax collected in the present
taxations system to the fullest extent by ensuring the entire produce of
agriculture both raw as well as processed is taxed in the retail through the
sales tax by completely controlling the “zero bill trade” through using the
Central petro fuel network authority (CPFNA) and Central materials movement
authority (CMMA) and Central toll tax authority (CTTA) by providing the state
specific and sector specific bar coded forms for each manufacturer and trader
to fill the form and submit online and get confirmation for movement of the
material from the manufacturing unit or from the traders godowan.(as stated in
my document in the “simple and effective reforms for controlling corruption and
delivering good governance”), in addition collection of various taxes by the
local governments, state governments and the central governments on the
business establishments by total integration of data of all the tax payers of
all districts and all states will certainly ensuring none will be escaped from
the tax evasion in one or the other place in one or other manner, which will
provide continues money supply year after year for taking care of the
operational expenses of the projects and programmes even without any need for
FDI in any sector only thing may be required is the technology transfers in
some sectors.
CONCLUSION
Since the surveys & statistics
regarding the organised retail in India especially the organised retail in food
sector reveals that there is an increase of over 74 % in a span of 5 years, which clearly indicates
that the urban pollution is India are patronizing the organized retailing due
to the fact that the organized retail will provide the ready to use food
grains, vegetables & fruits without need to spending time on grading,
sieving etc, as the organised retail is doing all these and processing the food
grains to make it ready to use condition. As such the governments decisions in
allowing FDI in Retail is absolutely justifiable in the event of patronisation
by the urban population especially the urban working class. But at the same
time the investments likely to be made by the multi brand retail giant stores for
the back end infrastructure development will only be advantageous to them at
large and to some extent to the farmers and to some extent the contractors and
the labour working for the contractors; since as per the government version
that it will not affect either the farmers and the small traders who are over
93 % at present and the organised retail may grow in a decade occupying only
another 8 % of the share of the un organised retail trade occupying about 15 %
of the total retail trade which will cater the needs of 25 % of the agriculture
produce including 10 % buffer stock holding of the multi brand retail giants
due to their financial, storage capacity for holding the stock for long; if it
holds good then government needs to encourage more FDI in Agriculture input
supply as well as back end infrastructure creation for the rest of the 75 % of
the total produce as as of now only 1/3 of the total agriculture produce has
the storage godowans; also in order to ensure fair trade and remove the perils
of many farmers and small traders in the un organised retail government should
mandatorily fix the minimum procurement price, minimum and maximum sale price
of the food grains, vegetables and fruits for protecting the interests of the
farmers, traders and consumers in the event of large storage long holding
capacity of food grains. Similarly the workers’ wages, the working hours,
labour laws PF, ESI, Health care of employees, the tax collection for profit
earned by these multi brand giant retail stores in India with having double
taxation avoidance agreements with the countries from where the FDI is coming
to India in the retail sector etc will certainly make the move of the
government in this regard a truly national boon; in addition government must
encourage the FDI in agriculture to make more food grains availability by providing
more water for cultivation through the cloud seeding/ weather modification,
water supply through creation of power generation privately through non
conventional sources, the fertilizer manufacturing and supply, the bio
pesticides manufacturing and supply and also the back end infrastructure
creation like Silo storage bins for food grains storage, the clod storages for
the vegetables & fruit storage and also the cold storage transport vehicles
etc will certainly save the hard made agriculture produce to a great extent
from wastage due to lack of storage facilities; which will ensure more supplies
of food grains and vegetables in the market not only in the organised sector
but also in the majority of the un organised sector ensuring stable prices of
the food grains and vegetables at all times; in addition the cloud seeding will
certainly make more water availability in the reservoirs which will enable more
power production in the hydro power, which means more industrial output due to
more power availability in addition to reduction in the pollution levels due to
reduction in use of coal for thermal power plants; and also making it mandatory that people pay
their payments through the check and making every bank deposit above Rs 10,000
in cash against legally bind able affidavit for the source of income, and
making all purchases above Rs 10,000 through bank card or bank check will
ensure more fund supply to the government; in addition correlation and
integration of data of all people in politics from village to national level
cutting across party lines, all elected members, ex members from the panchayat to the parliament; all
leaders of all parties from village level to national level, and also the same
is the case with bureaucrats, civil servants from the lowest in the village to
the highest in the central government, similarly it will be more ideal and
appropriate that judiciary should follow the same, also the individual business
persons and share holders in all the companies, firm, HUF, or property business
regarding their family tree and the assets and bank accounts; in addition
government fully controlling the materials movement in the country by creating
central materials movement authority to monitor the movement of all
manufactured and all trading goods from one place to other by providing the bar
coded format to get filled online and obtain permission for vehicle movement
which can be monitors through creation and integration of Central toll tax
authority through the creation and integration of the central petro fuels
authority for integration of petrol pumps to issue petrol only on reading the
electronic vehicle registration and driving licence; which will completely
eliminate the zero billing trading and under invoicing to some extent which provides
the revenues perennially for the governments which enables the governments to
stop accepting the FDI to the country and self development occurs to our own
sources which makes our country self sufficient and debt free over a period of
time making India the real super power nation
***
JAI HIND
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