Letters:Organised retail helps

This refers to your editorial “Adapt and innovate” (July 9). Organised retail is advantageous for both the producer and the consumer. As the editorial has pointed out, the Indian farmer gets only a third of what the final consumer pays, instead of the two-thirds that his counterparts do in countries that have organised retailing. It is the middleman who swallows one-third of what the consumers pay. Farmers get other facilities and, with no middleman in between, fair price of their produce from big retailers.

Consumers get better quality at lesser cost. India’s big business groups, like Reliance, which attempted to enter the retail business, were forced to close down their retail stores and withdraw due to violent protests by the trader-middleman lobby and the politicians who are always ready to exploit the situation to their benefit. Their argument that big retail outlets would eliminate the small trader and the street vegetable vendor is flawed. It has not been the case even in those countries where big retail chains have been operating for a long time now. Allowing FDI in multi-brand retail is the need of the hour. The government will have to withstand politically motivated opposition to organised retail and FDI. Also, it will have to ensure security for smooth operation of retail stores and desist from imposing unwarranted conditions.

M C Joshi, Lucknow