Problems and Prospects of Food-Retailing in the State of Uttar Pradesh (India)

Summary

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Improving farm productivity and competitiveness and diversification of agriculture towards production and marketing of high value crops have been conceived as major policy instruments for India's agricultural development. Involvement of private sector in agribusiness and marketing of agricultural produce has been initiated through Model Act on Agricultural Marketing 2003. Consequently a large number of private players have entered the food retailing business. The retail sector contributes about 10 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs 67 percent of the labour force in the country second only to agriculture. Under the changing scenario its share in GDP is expected to increase at a very high rate. Therefore, it becomes necessary for state governments to exploit the opportunities of changing business environment and demand patterns in order to achieve rural prosperity and better standard of living to the people. This paper has tried to highlight some issues related to agri-retailing and suggests a framework to provide an enabling environment in order to attract private investment in agricultural sector. This will not only help in increasing rural prosperity but also reduce the high prices of food by eliminating inefficiencies through reduction in post harvest losses, value addition and reduction in price fluctuations in the market.

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Problems and Prospects of Food-Retailing in the State of Uttar Pradesh (India)

INTRODUCTION

After independence, India's food policies were formulated under extreme food shortage, chronic poverty, acute scarcity of foreign exchange and greater demand for subsistence crops. But over a period the scenario has changed from a condition of scarcity to a condition of food surplus (Table 1), increase in purchasing power, huge reserves of foreign exchange and rising demand for processed and high value food products. Improving farm productivity, competitiveness and diversification towards high value farm products have become important. As per the population census 2001, about 228 million people in rural India, equivalent to 56 p...

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