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Foreign direct investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail will not help farmers in getting good prices for produce, creating infrastructure and reducing inflation, experts have said.
Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal said that instead of depending on foreign investment to improve back-end infrastructure like cold-storages, the government should focus on strengthening
domestic retail sector.
"It is a dream that foreign retailers like Walmart will come here to construct cold-storages and other back-end infrastructure. FDI will not help in reducing food prices too. In fact they go for predatory pricing and it will severely impact small traders," Khandelwal said.
He said that to bridge price difference between farm gate and consumers, the government should fix price bracket.
Expressing similar views, India FDI Watch Director Dharmendra Kumar said global foreign retailers will kill mom & pop stores in the country, which would lead to unemployment.
On the matter that FDI in the sector will