While NRAI’s Food and Services Report (IFSR) 2016, presented recently, suggests that the food service sector is growing in India, policies are still a major hurdle
Issues like licensing and other hurdles faced by the restaurant industry were at the fore at the release of India Food and Services Report (IFSR) 2016. While highlight-ing the growth and contribution of hospitality sector to the Indian economy, the trade report also high-lights consumer behaviour trends and issues faced by the food services industry “The food services industry has seen a steady growth over the last three years despite roadblocks and challenges,said Riyaaz Amlani, president of National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI). The report was released by Amitabh Kant, CEO, NITI Aayog, and in between facts and figures, Kant had some interesting stories to share during his speech. He said, “Cuisine is now an integral part of our lives. Obama was in France and he was giving a speech and it was being translated to the French president in French. Obama said ‘the spirit is willing, but the flesh is not’, and the translator told the French president, ‘whiskey is good but the meat is not so good’. This is what restaurants and food lead you to.” He added, `Advent of cookery shows has in many ways revived our interest in international cuisines, there’s new-found curiosity of global taste which has powered India’s food services sec-tor like never before.
Talking about why something like IFSR is needed for the industry, Kant said, “Restaurant sector contributes highest to manpower requirements, it provides huge impetus to other sectors as well, agriculture, food processing, supply chain, real estate, kitchen equipment, all these sectors grow as a con-sequence of restaurants and therefore, against this backdrop, there is an imperative need for the paper that documents var-ious developments in industry. This edition of IFSR seeks to draw attention to many facts and findings pertinent to the sector,” he said.
While suggesting a solution to the complex system of licensing, he said, “In the indus-try sector, we realised that the challenge lies in states and therefore we made the states compete with each other. So we named and shamed the states and they were ranked, and this ranking is continuing this year. We are ranking them on various points and there is huge amount of work done by states in making themselves easy and simple. I think that tourism industry should do the same thing for restaurants to make things simple, including excise, licensing, which has be-come very difficult and complex. Licenses and taxes have to be made simpler so that required assistance and support should be provided to restaurant industry”