Textile Ministry favours FDI in multi-brand retail

Contrary to the views of Narendra Modi-led government, the Ministry of Textiles is

in favour of FDI in multi brand retail. The ministry in its strategy report has recommended FDI in single and multi-brand retail under automatic route but restricted it only to Indian apparel brands. The earlier UPA government had allowed FDI only in foreign brand/retail, which is owned and operated by an international company. However, the ministry is of the opinion that Indian-grown brand require a strong funding boost to taste success in dedicated retail stores for single and multiple Indian brands. It has further recommended that India should follow the Turkish model of promoting domestic labels into overseas markets.

The ministry has also come up with a proposal to conduct a scientific, systematic anthropometric study of Indian population for developing a standard Indian sizing system. Anthropometry refers to the measurement of the human individual and plays an important role in industrial design, clothing design, ergonomics and architecture where statistical data about the distribution of body dimensions in the population are used to optimize products.

The strategy report also suggested that India’s share in several finished goods categories such as suits, women’s western wear, intimate wear, swimwear, and outerwear, which has multibillion dollar trade globally as well as in large markets like Japan, Russia, South Korea and Switzerland, needs to be boosted. It has suggested that country specific export strategies should be developed and implemented to achieve this goal.

Also to promote exports of non-traditional products in the export markets, the ministry has recommended extension of five year tax holiday for designated companies on exports of specific finished good items such as apparel, made-ups and technical textiles, if their annual export growth is over 25 per cent.