BANGALORE: While Union Minister for Corporate Affairs Veerappa Moily made a passionate appeal for the Centre’s proposal to open up the retail sector to Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), he was confronted on the issue by former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, who was also present on the occasion.“The Global Agri-business Summit should not be understood as endorsing the UPA’s decision to open up the nation’s retail sector,” Yeddyurappa said, during his address at the valedictory of the Global Agri-business and Food Processing Summit-2011.This was in response to an earlier statement by Moily, who while commending the state government for its initiative to organise the summit, said that it would espouse the Centre’s cause to increase FDI in retail sector.He appealed to the Union minister to convince the Centre to withdraw the proposal, in addition to urging nationalised banks to extend farm loans at an interest rate of one per cent per annum.“The state government has started disbursing farm loans at one per cent through cooperative societies,” he said. Earlier, while castigating the opponents to the UPA government’s decision to invite FDI, Moily advised them to look at the progress made by China which has reaped rich dividends by doing so.“The number of domestic and traditional retailers in China witnessed a quantum jump from 1.9 million units to over 2.5 million,” he said. He added that this resulted in the establishment of as many as 6,000 supermarkets in the Communist country, in addition to strengthening the supply chain platform.“Unless we have an open mindset, we cannot hope for our country to prosper. There is nothing more criminal than preventing the farming community to prosper,” he said, adding that the need to address prejudices on FDI in the retail sector was important.
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