Direct sales business growing fast, but needs regulation: study
21 Mar 2011
The direct selling business in India has almost doubled in the last five years and is set to grow rapidly in rural areas, a report from the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) says.
Despite being a relatively new sector in India, direct selling is growing at around 20 per cent, says the report. The total number of direct sellers in India has almost doubled between 2004 and 2009.
The report also says the Indian direct selling market, which is growing at 20 per cent annually and is expected to touch Rs71,500 crore by 2013, needs a nodal ministry to formulate legislations for the sector in order to maintain the growth momentum.
Releasing the report in New Delhi, Ashwani Kumar, minister of state for planning, science and technology and parliamentary affairs, said, ''While information technology and IT-enabled services (ITeS) have been considerably discussed areas in the service sector, the growth and employment generating potential of other services like direct selling need to be explored further.''
India ranks 11th among the top direct selling countries, with over three million direct sellers in 2009.
Companies are spreading operations from metropolitan cities to smaller cities and even trying to explore rural markets, said the ICRIER report on 'Socio-economic impact of direct selling: need for policy stimulus'.
