Ease of doing business for MSMEs: Hailing the government’s open e-commerce network Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) as a solution to the challenges faced by small business sellers on various e-commerce platforms, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said the network will provide a much larger market for sellers without any preferred or priority sellers, ensuring equitable and fair treatment for all stakeholders. Goyal noted that ONDC will foster economies of scale, competition, and better pricing and quality, ultimately benefiting consumers.
“ONDC was born in such a manner when the e-commerce sector was grappling with multiple challenges and small businesses were under threat,” the minister said at an event on ONDC. He added that the need for alternate ways to address such challenges of the e-commerce ecosystem while balancing the interests of small retailers and businesses led to the evolution of ONDC.
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ONDC was announced in 2021 to cater to the challenge of digital monopolies and digitize the entire value chain, standardize operations, promote inclusion of suppliers, derive efficiencies in logistics and enhance value for consumers. E-commerce in India, which is likely to be worth $188 billion market by 2025 as per Grant Thornton, is currently led by Walmart’s Flipkart and Amazon India.
Importantly, the trader community in the country represented by the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) has been alleging unethical businesses such as priority to certain sellers, price distortion, and more by e-commerce companies for the past few years. The launch of ONDC caters to solving this issue.
Goyal said that efforts are being undertaken to ensure that e-commerce becomes an engine of growth that empowers both buyers and sellers. He highlighted that ONDC will unlock doors of opportunities in an inclusive manner for both big and small businesses, benefitting the entire value chain of commerce.
Moreover, “small artisans and workers can offer better quality through ONDC and also earn better without having to pay commission for their products.”
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