A new initiative promotes e-commerce for strengthening the national and international market of handicrafts
The Union Minister for Tribal Affairs, Jual Oram launched ‘e-Tribes:Tribes India’, an initiative for digital commerce at Tribes India Outlet in New Delhi. It included the launch of e-commerce portal of TRIFED and M-commerce, android app ‘Tribes India’. In a path breaking initiative, the Minister also launched the Tribes India banner on Snapdeal, Amazon, Paytm and GeM for marketing tribal products through these e-commerce portals. With this, more than 55 thousand tribal artisans connected to TRIFED will get access to local as well as International markets. The Minister of State for Tribal affairs, Jasvantsinh Sumanbhai Bhabhor and the Minister of State for Tribal affairs, Sudarshan Bhagat and senior officers of the Ministry were also present on the occasion.
Congratulating TRIFED for a sterling performance in retail sales during the current financial year 2017-18, Jual Oram commended the dedicated team of officers for promoting e-commerce for tribal artisans, which will provide a window towards a national and international markets. Tribes India has now started marketing tribal handicrafts on e-commerce portals namely, Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal and GeM, which will prove to be a game changer for tribal artisans, the Minister explained. The organisation has set up an ambitious retail sales target of Rs 100 crores to be achieved during the year 2018-19 which they hope to achieve with the help of e-commerce. The Minister stated that no stone should be left unturned in the empowerment of tribals through trade and all the steps will be taken to ensure that they get full and timely payments.
The Minister also lauded TRIFED for organising Aadi Mahotsavas in Delhi, Jaipur, Bhopal, Ranchi, Chandigarh and Guwahati, where almost 20,000 tribal artisans had the opportunity to directly link up with big markets and achieve sales of almost Rs 5 crores. Each tribal artisan earned between Rs 2 lakhs to Rs 15 lakhs.
It was a matter of satisfaction that the Minimum Support Price and Value Addition Scheme for minor forest produces has now been extended to 19 states and Value Addition has been given high priority. TRIFED has set a target for setting up 30,000 value addition centres in rural areas in conjunction with Ministry of Rural Development and Panchayat Raj during the year 2018-19. Jual Oram said that all efforts are made to take this programme to the next level, which includes strengthening Haat Bazar infrastructure including creation of network for procurement centres, godowns and other logistic support systems. Pricing of minor forest produces need to be carefully done so that tribals can get best price for their products. The government will give grants to TRIFED to help expand its activities.
The Minister of State for Tribal affairs, Sudarshan Bhagat stated that the launch of e-commerce site will help to eliminate intermediaries and bring artisans directly in touch with buyers.
The event also incorporated launching the retail inventory software prepared by TRIFED, where in all sales and procurement would be digitised.
It has also prepared a hand book for its retail trade namely Aadi Vyapar to institutionalise the sale and procurement operations. This was also launched by the Minister during the programme. TRIFED has started the publication of a quarterly news magazine TRIBES HAAT to provide information to all its stake holders and customers about its activities and to attract them to be partners in the tribal development strategy.