IKEA is a Swedish giant that specialises in flat-packing furniture and other furnishing goods, which now plans on making it big in Uttar Pradesh. Reaching Uttar Pradesh’s Noida to establish its biggest Indian store in a few weeks, this global brand has opened a gateway of employment opportunities in the state. In a statement issued by the Uttar Pradesh government, IKEA has planned to establish 12 outlets in the state by 2025, through a budget of ₹5,000 crores. The company aims to place itself in 40 cities in India by 2030.
Steps towards creating a self-reliant UP
IKEA’s Noida project is an integrated commercial unit which will expand over a terrain of 47,833 square meters of land, providing the locals with about 1,000 direct jobs and around a thousand such indirect vacancies. This comes as a major relief to several individuals who lost their jobs due to the lockdown.
According to the initial MoUs signed in 2015, IKEA had proposed to install its units in three major UP districts, including Lucknow, Agra and Noida. The company had slated a budget of ₹500 crore for each set-up. However, with the revised MoU of 2018, has now indexed a greater investment, with more number of cities under its ambit.
IKEA’s standard stores are usually established over 40,000 square meters of lands. Owing to the ordeal of finding that kind of free-space for commercial purposes is not available in most districts, the company has decided to remodel its organisational setup. IKEA has decided to install smaller units, either as individual, stand-alone shops or within malls.
State officials for commerce have highlighted how global markets hold the potential to raise the market, business and employment rates in developing centres in the state. He also lauded the Chief Minister’s long term vision of creating a self-reliant Uttar Pradesh and getting world-class goods within arm’s reach of its citizens simultaneously.
