Unified policy for FMCG, retail, e-commerce: Amitabh Kant

Over the last two years, the Modi Government has come out with several changes in India’s retail policies. From easing FDI norms to giving the green signal to the long-stalled GST bill, the past few months have witnessed the Government’s determination to improve ease of doing business in India.
Read: FDI in retail: Milestones from 2006 to 2016
Now, acknowledging the fact that India is the only country in the world to have separate policies for multi-brand retail, single-brand retail and now e-commerce, the Government is planning to come up with single policy for retail, FMCG and e-commerce. Speaking at FICCI’s annual retail, FMCG and e-commerce convention, Massmerize 2016, NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said,” Going forward, all of this will become one policy framework, which will address the common industry and consumers’ concerns.”
“This will bring all the stakeholders to the same page and there will be no conflict of interest,” he added.
Throwing light on the Government’s determination to improve complex business policies in India, Kant said, “Over the last 68 years we have only added rules, regulation, and policies and it has impacted lot of consumers and businesses. Today, we are determined to give this a fillip and a lot of work has already started towards this,” he said.
Read: Emphasize on Make-in-India, not Make-in-China, says Amitabh Kant to e-comm companies
“For instance, a 14-page registration form for a small and medium enterprise (SME) has come down to one page. Today, to register a company you just need a day as against six months earlier. Above all, there has been a mindset change at the top of the bureaucracy which is changing down the layers,” he added.
In the coming years, he hopes this will be further simplified, “Over the next three to four years, there should be one-page law, one-page form, two-page rules, and act should not be more than three pages.”