new delhi open network for digital commerce ondc will provide equal opportunities to small retailers to enjoy the benefits of digital world and permit them to trade on a common platform commerce and industry minister piyush goyal said on fridayon april 29 the government launched the pilot phase of ondc a upitype protocol in five cities it was aimed at democratising the fast growing ecommerce sector helping small retailers and reducing the dominance of online retail giantsgoyal said that small retailers very existence could have come under threat with the growing influence of large format ecommerce companies which are indulging in several irregular practices and are under investigations by the directorate of enforcement advt in countries like the us the big ecommerce giants have severely impacted small retail shops leading to large scale unemploymentwe do not want that to happen in india we want them small retailers to get an opportunity to use technology to serve our consumers we want them to get an equal opportunity to enjoy the fruits of the digital world we want their data to be protected he told reportersondc is a set of protocols and a technologybased solution which allows everybody to trade on a common platform he saideverybody is aware about the malpractices that are followed by the big ecommerce companies in terms of how they are giving preference to their own sister companies and where they have shareholdings he saidsuch practices result in exploitation of sellers he addedondc will provide a huge number of choices to consumers in a way it is a medium to democratise ecommerce it will provide equal opportunities to sell products and all consumers will get good number of choices goyal saidondc is a set of standards for voluntary adoption by sellers or logistics providers or payment gatewayswhen asked about the news report concerning rejection of an indian wheat consignment by turkey on phytosanitary concerns the minister said that he has inquired about the issue and found that itc has exported wheat to a netherland buyer after following the due process and quality check advt he further said that itc is a reputed company and exports good quality wheat and added i am sure that indian wheat is of best qualityindia has exported 70 lakh tonnes of wheat in the last fiscal and 145 lakh tonnes in april and this reflects that world over indian wheat is welcomed he said tnn published on jun 4 2022 at 1120 am ist telegram facebook copy link be the first one to comment comment now comments comment now read comment 1 all comments post post find this comment offensive choose your reason below and click on the submit button this will alert our moderators to take actions reasons for reporting foul language defamatory inciting hatred against a certain community out of context spam others report join the community of 2m industry professionals subscribe to our newsletter to get latest insights analysis download etretail app get realtime updates save your