Walmart, one of the world’s largest brick-and-mortar retailers, has decided open 50 stores across India over the next 5-7 years. It is estimated that each store will require an investment of about $10 million.
On the sidelines of the State of Maharashtra’s Agribusiness and Rural Transformation (SMART) event , which took place in Mumbai recently, Krish Iyer, president and chief executive officer, Walmart India, said that the overall country plan for India was on track and the company had already signed up for 24 stores in the country.
He added that the company was currently focussing towards Tier-II cities as they offered a good opportunity to serve the kirana stores and source from agri products from rural markets.
Meanwhile, Walmart will directly source from farmers in Maharashtra in a big manner, and the produce will be sold in its stores across India. Iyer said, “In the stores which cover an area ranging between 50,000 to 10,00,000 sq feet, 60 to 70 per cent of the available space is being used to sell food. Now, we are planning to start direct sourcing from farmers, not only for our stores in Maharashtra, but for all the stores across India.”
The company, which has two stores in Amravati and Aurangabad, is planning to open 15 more stores in Maharashtra.
Iyer said, “We have identified eight cities in the state. We have signed Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) with the state government to open 15 stores, which will provide 2,000 direct and indirects jobs to farmers. Thus, expansion and investments in agri-food business will lead to the generation of 30,000 to 35,000 jobs over the next few years.”
He added, “Walmart has its presence in India for the last 10 years. However, in the last four years, it has made progress, particularly in the agriculture sector, by direct souring from small and marginal farmers in many states in the country.”
Walmart is also making progress in establishing back-end intrastructure in the state. Iyer said, “Walmart owns a chain of stores in the United Kingdom called ASDA, and exports 100 containers of grapes ever year from the state of Maharashtra.”
“Walmart now also plans to source bananas, oranges, pomegranate, onions, potatoes and Alphonso mangoes from the state and distribute to stores across India as well. The back-end work is on and within six months further development will be seen,” he added.
However, Iyer claimed that of the total quantity of fruits and vegetables which are produced in the country, aobut 30-40 per cent gets wasted. Thus, Walmart wants to work together with farmers, so that they can be guided on how to reduce food wastage and get better prices for their produce. It will also benefit the consumers, who can purchase the products at good prices. He said, “In the next 4-5 years the change will be seen.”
Iyer added, “Fruits like strawberry from Mahabaleshwar and pomegranate and grapes from Nashik in Maharashtra provide great opportunities, and the company has deployed manpower on the ground to help with capacity building for farmers in the next 6-10 months.”
The objective of SMART, which was assisted by World Bank, was to revamp the agricultural value chain and improve the price realisation for farmers. Over 49 companies, including Tata Group, Amazon, ITC, Patanjali, Reliance Retail, Walmart, BigBasket and Mahindra Agro, among others, inked a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Government of Maharashtra.
