Retail expansion to continue in India

DQW News Bureau

New Delhi: The boom in India's retail sector will continue and top $365
billion in 2008, against $300 billion a year before, said a study by the
Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (Assocham).

According to Assocham, with a YoY growth of 30 to 35 percent, the retail
trade sector in India will top $440 billion by 2010.

“The retail industry size in calendar 2007, particularly in its organized
retail segment, is around less than five percent, which works out to be slightly
more than $16 billion,” said Venugopal N Dhoot, Chamber President.

He also said the organized retail players occupied a space of one million sq
ft in 2002, which shot up to nearly 14 million sq ft by calendar 2007. This, he
said, was likely to grow to 16 million sq ft in 2008.

Large players like Reliance Industries, Plaza, DLF and Spenser, and
new-entrant in the field, the Aditya Birla Group, would embark on a major
expansion drive in their retail businesses in 2008, Dhoot added.

The study estimated the organized retail segment would witness an additional
investment of $70 billion by 2010. In 2008, the investment size would be in the
region of $25-28 billion.

The study also estimated that that the share of retail trade in the country's
gross domestic product, currently at between 8-10 percent, will jump up to some
12 percent soon and to 22 percent by 2010.

The study also estimated that rural retail would continue to be driven by the
unorganized segment for some time, and grow to $36 billion by 2008 and top $45
billion in 2015, from the present size of $30 billion.