Govt to discuss GI tags with online retailers
BENGALURU: The commerce and industry ministry and the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) is expected to ask top online retailers such as Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal to focus on listing and promoting geographical indication (GI) products to provide visibility to locally produced items.
The government is expected to meet this week executives from these e-commerce firms to discuss and identify GI products that have maximum demand in the market for a “pilot project”, said four people aware of the discussions. GI tag is used on products that correspond to a specific geographical location or origin, including a certain town or region in India. These include Darjeeling tea, Coorg Arabica coffee and Kashmiri saffron, to name a few. India has registered 361 GI products, as of March 2020.
GI products were earlier sold largely through offline retail.
The meeting, which is expected to be presided over by the DPIIT joint secretary, will also discuss ways to promote and market the selected GI products to increase their visibility and awareness.
The government will also discuss with e-commerce platforms the training and orientation of sellers of GI products for their listing, shipping as well as exports.
“The meeting will be on figuring out a standardized practice of listing these products on e-commerce platforms, and digital literacy, which is needed to be provided to manufacturers, sellers and cooperative societies manufacturing and selling these geographical indication products,” said one of the people cited above, who didn’t want to be named.
The person said the government wants to help these manufacturers and sellers move to a self-serve model, where they can leverage online commerce independently to boost sales.
A second person said the government will also ask the online retailers to add respective logos on online listings of these products for greater visibility.