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Business & Economy
Educated village India
spurs product growth
What is India News Service, Monday, 2
May 2005, 1700 hrs IST
Consumer goods manufacturers, auto makers and readymade food makers
are wooing rural India with renewed vigour.
Each one in their segment is trying new strategy and outdoing the other to get a better share of the market.
Lots of organisations like never before are spending on building brands targetted to the rural consumers which uptill now was a domain of FMCG companies only. Greater awareness, deepening of education amongst the rural citizens, awareness among women and greater consciousness of better lifestyle is driving the rural India to consumerism.
Recent study done by Indian Readership Survey (IRS) 2005, reveals that the number of illiterate declined from 41 per cent in 1998 to 36 per cent and those educated below 4th standard declined to 9 per cent from 11 per cent. On the other hand, those who had passed their school-leaving examination had increased from 44 per cent to 50 per cent. Amongst women 31 per cent are educated more than class 5th thus giving us a good indicator of demand coming from kitchens and backyards of rural India.
The increase in education levels is the reason why one can see a good growth of FMCG goods like soaps, shampoos, kitchen items etc. Amongst the top items that are consumed in rural areas, shampoos account for a 68 per cent rural market share, toilet soaps 53 percent and soft drinks 54 per cent, hair oil 76 per cent and skin cream 58 percent . Education levels has led to consumption of better health goods, the share of packaged edible oils, picked up and accounted for 26% of the oil purchases in 2005 as compared to 20% in 1998. Data showed that there is a definite demand for branded eatables like noodles, ketchup, pre packaged branded tea indicative of choice made by educated housewives.
In the consumer durable segment, which is a fair indicator of crossing over poverty, the demand for black & white TV is still huge. Rural households accounted for 64 per cent of television sales.The total sales of television has increased from 55mn sets in 1998 to 83mn in 2005.
FM
may dilute tax on fringe benefits: Finance
Minister P. Chidambaram is likely to \93dilute\94 the controversial tax on
fringe benefits paid to corporate sector employees by their companies and
announce exemption to 0.10 per cent charge on withdrawal of cash by the
accountholders from their saving bank accounts.
Iran
pipeline gas $ 1.50 mbtu away: India
is willing to pay no more than 2.50 dollars per million British thermal unit (mBtu)
for the Iranian gas to be imported through a 2600-km pipeline via Pakistan.
FIIs' open positions in derivatives segment hit record 42%: Foreign
institutional investors' investments in the derivatives markets have gone up
sharply with their total gross market positions crossing over 40 per cent.
BHEL's
net profit up 34%: BHEL
has reported a 34.33 percent rise in net profit at Rs 584.63 crore during the
fourth quarter of 2004-05 against Rs 435.19 crore in the previous Q4.
Chinese
growth fuels earnings of Indian shipping cos: While the growing economic
might of the Red Dragon may be spreading ripples of insecurity across certain
corporate sectors in India, there is one sector that is actually making money
out of this. And that is the Indian shipping sector.
NTPC
scouts for partners to acquire coal mines abroad: National Thermal Power
Corporation Ltd (NTPC) is scouting for partners to acquire coal mines abroad.
Choose
between RIL, Infocomm, staff told: Top
executives of Reliance Infocomm have been asked whether they would like to stay
with the company or move over to the group\92s flagship company RIL, indicating
thereby that the ownership of Infocomm may change from its current Chairman
Mukesh Ambani to the younger sibling, Anil, as part of a settlement of the feud
between them.
Spice
slashes roaming charges by 33 pc: Spice Telecom today announced that it has
slashed roaming airtime charges by 33 pc while roaming in India with effect from
May 1.
'Oil
cos incur a loss of Rs 20,000 crore':
Consequent to the hike in international prices, steps should be
taken to supplement the loss of revenue to oil companies, failing which the
losses would mount, Union Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar has said.
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