Congress has gone all out to defend
FDI in retail with atwo headed approach.
One head led by Kapil Sibal was
trying to prove that FDI might be a monster which would not make any
significant change. He velehmently trivialized its impact and even suggested
that it was a non-issue for the larger part of our country.
The other head has tried to showcase
FDI as the one point solution all ills related to the farm sector supply chain
be it procurement, distribution, storage et al. This head was represented by
young turks like Junior Hooda and once NSUI leader Anand Sharma.
If we join various dots from both
the versions, we may clearly see the ambiguity, misrepresentation and above all
a ploy to distract from the real issues. I am providing a few examples below:
FDI
in retail will remove supply side deficiencies by removing the middlemen:
Everyone will acknowledge that
middlemen should be removed from the farm sector. However, is FDI the only
option available with the government? Can't the government come up with
structural reforms in managing the supply, procurement and storage of food
products? If the government and the congress party is so keen to cut the
middlemen, they may bring a legislation to mandate a structural change in the
current set up of the wholesale market. Government may increase its
responsibility in this area and take up an active role. Is the onus of removing
the middlemen lies with Wal-Mart? Is this not an outsourcing of core governance
issues to large Multinational corporations? Will Wal-Mart now be responsible to
reform the wholesale market and take own the price index?
Milk production and supply chain is
an example of government enabled value chain:
Milk is a farm product which reaches
consumers at the right time and right price. Farmers also get a fair price.
This happens although Milk is a perishable product and needs a comprehensive
storage and transportation facilities. We have no Wal-Mart or FDI in this milk
processing and supply. If government or government aligned agencies can manage
this perishable product without any middlemen (Adithya), why can't we do the
same with fruits and vegetables.
Sardar Patel had left a legacy in Gujarat
which worked well for the milk farmers. However,leaders like Dr. Manmohan Singh,
P Chidambram, Montek Singh etc. have studied abroad, and have also worked outside India for a large part of their productive life, and can seldom think beyond a
foreign aid.
This genre lacks confidence on even
tried and tested Indian methods. However, they are very suave and possess an
uncanny ability to spin their point of view with a barrage of misinformation.
It is time for the country to realize this and oppose FDI in
retail. Let the ministry of Agriculture, Food Supplies and Home draft a bill to
improve the farm sector. We can’t allow them to outsource their own
responsibilities to a Wal-Mart.
