Meeting on FDI fails to reach conclusive decision

The meeting between Anand Sharma, Minister for Commerce

and Industry and stakeholders in the retail space held last week, failed to reach a conclusive concrete decision or provide any clarity on key issues relating FDI and back-end infrastructure and sourcing from the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector. Although most issues came up at the meeting, the government offered no clear clarifications on any of them.

The government, which threw open the multi-brand retail space to foreign direct investment (FDI) in September, 2012, is yet to receive a single application. Foreign retailers are allowed to hold up to 51 percent stake in a multi-brand retail venture. “Quite a few questions were raised and a number of clarifications were sought by the retailers,” Sharma said after the meeting, adding the government would give more clarifications where needed. “This is an ongoing dialogue between the government and the industry and we want to facilitate foreign investment in the sector,” he added.

Retailers came away from the meeting not expecting an early decision on any of the contentious issues. The meeting was attended by representatives from Tesco, Carrefour, Bharti Enterprises, Aditya Birla Group,Tata, Reliance Industries, Metro Cash & Carry and Landmark Group among others.