<p>The Govt. is finally trying to open the India Retail sector to foreign companies in a big way. Is this good or is it bad for our country?</p>
Say No to FDI
Amul has proved that organized retail can be achieved. Hopcoms has proved it. Indian farm lands are small. Once huge numbers of neighboring farmlands are acquired they will be connected into one to optimize resources. Organized retail is not FDI. Organized retail can be achieved by better storage and processing of crops. If a foreign investors can do it, why can't the government or small co-operatives do it? Investment directly looks into profit and loss. Government (ideally) looks into welfare. Which model then, must be implemented?
Last 25-30 years have seen the withdrawal of state from sectors that matter the most to the poor, a steady transfer of resources from the poor to the rich. The dominant feature of mass media across the globe is that media are entirely corporate owned. Same is the stste of politics, atleast in India. While we can celebrate the claim that 60-70% Indians have mobile phones, about the same number have no bank accounts. If 20 years of liberalisation cannot put a dent on child malnourishment figures, something is wrong.
The only way to tackle the present economic crisis is by curbing monopoly ownerships. When cost of milk increase by a Rupee in Amul, it means each and every of those millions of milkmen are getting a rupee extra more for a litre of milk. When cost of vegetables increase in Reliance fresh, it means that the Ambanis are making money and the farmers are anyways dying.
Read more-- http://www.sankalpindia.net/drupal/farmer-suicides/economics-kills
Privatize everything!
When government is privatizing every sector of the society in the name of PPP or FDI, then the government should tackle the roots of the problem. The roots of the problem is in the government itself. Let the government itself be privatized. Let there be a global tender to rule the country. Why only Indians should rule the country. Let the country be more efficient. If governnment thinks that privatization is the solution, then privatize the government itself instead of selling away the country bit by bit!
I wonder why the Government
I wonder why the Government and it's mouthpieces are trying to spread a notion that the problems associated with better collection, storage, trasportation and destribution of farm products can only be tacked with FDI? It's good that DSardar Patel thought otherwise.
There was a time when milk was one commodity which was scarcely available and even imported in our country. then came a long battle which finally resulted in the cooperative milk federations of India. Today each state has it's own cooperative mil federation which has ensured good supply of mil products at a resonable rate in a sustained kind of a manner with the profits beng distributed to the produces in a very effective way!
Organised retail IS NOT EQUAL TO FDI.
Corporates ARE NOT EQUAL TO best interest of the producer.
Who does not know that Walmarts and TESCO are known to buyout or lease huge farms where they do cultivation by their own methods and techniques and the system is so highly optimised. Image that having been done during operation white flood. What would have happened to the crores of poeple who earn their living by supplying milk to Amul?
We can do another Amul! Improvement in Indian Retail is required. But how to bring that in is a question.
If they go ahead with this, then probably the Government should already start working of relif ackage that it will offer to the corpse of the numerous people after striping them off their livelihood and dignity.
When the government offered waiver of the loans given to farmers after numbeorus suicides had happened - I dont know if we noticed the text in small print. We cant offer you better rates for your crop. We wont protect you from exploitation by imp-ex lobbies. We will not stand by you when you try to earn your bread with dignity!. Once you haev lost your life, your happiness, your livelyhood, we will offer a compensation package - ot to you farm labour - but to your employer - the owner of the farm who takes bank loans!
What more you need to know before deciding upon FDI
Past two decades have seen an unprecedented rise in the number of farmer suicides in our country. Across the nation, lacks of farmers have taken their lives in these years. Though this process is on for almost 2 decades, but it is only now that the nation is getting to know the seriousness and the extent of it. We are going through the worst ever farm crisis in the history of our nation. READ MORE
It is a very well known fact that the farm crisis in India is a result of bad policies and not due to the market itself. For instance:
- the high suicide rates in the Maharashtra/Andhra Pradesh belt are thanks to the inability of the Government to prevent cheep subsidised imports which bring the price of the locally grown cash crops tumbling down.
- It is known that the Goverment is hands in glove with trader lobbies whcih first export the local produce creating scarcity in the country and then gain from the higher prices, like with the case of tomato exports recently.
- It is well known that the FCI godowns are ratholes which distroy the food crop that rightfully should go to the poorest of poor.
Quoting my cousin - "Government is meant for governance and it should do just that". Our Prime Minister, instead of taking responsibility to fix the issues with Governance, instead of looking into better ways of price control by keeping tab on the imports and exports, instead of strengthening the cleansing FCI is mooting the idea of letting foreign investment in!
For a country like India, with it's population and it's poverty, instead of encouraging and fixing the more people oriented models like Mandi Samitis and Cooperatives, (which could be streamlined to run like Amuls - championing the larger interest of society), you are taking steps which will break the very backbone of India's markets!
Mr Singh, we have some problems with defence supplies. Is your next masterstroke bringing Chinese money into it?