Retailers` Day At Food Forum
The event focussed on innovation and transparency in the food industry
Stalwarts from the food industry assembled at the Renaissance Hotel last week to participate in the grand finale of Food Forum India 2009 organised by Images Group, the IRF (India Retail Forum) fame India's leading event organising group. The day 2 of the Food Forum which was supported by the Ministry of Food Processing Industries, began with a GlobalGap Conclave on the theme 'Managing Complexity of Food Quality: International Quality Assurance and Food Safety Benchmarks,' anchored by Kristian Moeller, MD, GlobalGap Germany. Other interactive sessions for the day included Food Infrastructure that highlighted the needs and methods of building efficient infrastructure for fresh produce. Thomas Vargese, CEO, Aditya Birla Retail, Damodar Mall, customer director, Future Group and Ashok Bhasin, MD Wadhwan Food Retail, participated enthusiastically in a Q& A session touching upon topics like mergers & acquisitions, private labels & differentiation and locations and customers. The exhibition held alongside saw a huge number of visitors particularly foreigners gathering at different stalls to learn and exchange interesting trade ideas.
Food Support, one of the most engaging sessions for the day, was hosted by three foreign participants - Christian Rikkers of Jos De Vries, Netherlands, spoke on the topic 'Design for Food Retail and Catering.' Markus Ehrich from the UK-based Baro, gave tips on perfect retail lighting and Soren C Sorensen from Redpack, UK, discussed 'Strategic Packaging Design' for the modern retail concept.
The highlight for the day was the mega open conclave that saw CEOs of the retail and brand majors debating on the likely role that retailers and brand manufacturers can play independently or jointly to attract modern trade consumer. Kishore Biyani, the CEO of the Future Group, led the audience on a laughter riot with his whacky and witty replies to the questions shot to him by Anish Trivedi of Banyan Tree Communications and Jayant Kochar of Go Fish Retail Solutions.
In the GlobalGap conclave a panel of experts from the industry discussed the importance of bridging the virtual gap in the country's supply chain and food safety network that created a resultant 'inland' separating the farmers from the network. Peter Funk, GM, SGF International e.V. said, 'Laboratories for food testing were the most responsible component in food safety. We could manage a 30% increased turnover only because our client companies progressed by relying on us for testing procedures.'
Gunendar Kapur, president and chief executive, Food Business, RIL, said that the supply chain network needed to be more robust. He said, 'Lab testing is important but needs to be followed at every step of the food network rather than the end product.' The supply chain could not be effective unless it travelled right to the farmers. It is important to have concepts like HACCP and Codex introduced at all points in the food network.
Abhijit Upadhye, director, National Supply Chain, McDonald's India, said that even a simple thing like a woman working in the field that produced lettuce could create a possible food scare with the bangles she wears.
The gap between the food safety standards and current level of implementation is wide in India, therefore, certain threshold investments at farm level is required. At the taluka/block level there is only a single operational plant protection unit, so the knowledge about the pesticides and technology used in the farms is low among the farmers.
S Dave, director, Apeda, and vice-chairman, Codex Alimentarius Commission, narrated the success story of the 'grape-net' concept where the traceability mechanism was introduced to avoid the ban on exports that India was likely to face in 2003. Dave said, 'We started the capacity building exercise like implementing good agricultural practices and there was not a single rejection in the following year.'
Dave urged the private sector to cooperate with the public sector to handle the existing 1.3 million farms in the country.
The importance of good packaging strategy and consumer driven retail was appreciated by all in the panel of experts. It was also suggested that value proposition should be given to the farmers just as those given to the retailers. The efficient use of technology like the web interface, mobiles and the sms services could build up the gap and turn the inland to a plateau.
To have a strong supply chain in place food infrastructure becomes the most important and connecting factor. Speaking on food infrastructure, Sanjay Sethi, VP, food and agriculture, Technopak Advisors, said that albeit the government subsidy of 50 crore was being given for starting a mega food park, not many showed interest in the scheme. Sethi also highlighted the current situation of cold storages in India. He said, 'In the next 2-3 years a gap of 9,000 cold storages is realised. Also, the country would require around 90,000 refer vehicles by 2014-15. The industry players can make the most of this situation.' Sethi also thought that the air cargo in the country with capacity of 15 tonnes was no better than the service trucks. He appreciated the government for coming up with aggressive policies for the food industry. Right talent should be complemented with the infrastructural demand to create fantastic terminal markets. N Srinivas, technical director, Lloyd Insulation, said, 'An unbroken cold chain is a dream of all. It will enable us to progress, produce less waste, increase export opportunities and distribute wealth by creating entrepreneurial and job opportunities and thus improve the quality of life.'
Thomas Vargese of Aditya Birla Group spoke on mergers and acquisitions. He thought that for any organisation that looked forward for expanding its footprint in retail this was the best opportunity. He said, 'Your ability to build a valuable business is the only quality required in the food business and a company with an intrinsically sound business model can make the most of this opportunity.'
The ready-to-eat concept is in demand. Speaking on Food Support, Christian Rikkers said that this was the age of food services rather than the traditional food stores, so integration of food retail and food services was required.
Packaging design is another spoken about concept in the modern retail market. Soren C Sorensen urged the audience to move beyond price wars and technology wars to create a good packaging design. He said, 'Invest your time and energy in good designs as people come to you if you are different. ' He also suggested the extensive use of pictograms on packages to serve as a tool of communication in overcoming linguistic and literacy barriers. Lighting was another interesting concept touched upon by Markus Ehrich. Markus said, 'For good retail practices it's not important that you use too many lamps but you should rather direct the light in the right place.'
Towards the end of the day-long session, Kishore Biyani was invited to have a short conversation with the audience. Biyani thought that retailing was a big canvas for a retailer to display his business acumen. It was the retailer's responsibility to create a demand for value added products. On Future Group's business plan, Biyani said that the company was looking forward to collaborate with brands and also to create value added products including toothpaste.
The mega open conclave gave an apt climax to the 2-day long forum. Brand manufacturers and retailers took the stage to debate upon the idealistic collaboration between the two and the challenges faced in serving the modern trade consumer. Both the parties unanimously accepted the fact that innovation in products and transparency in data were the two requirements that served jointly the needs of the consumer, retailer and the brand manufacturer.
