The formation of a strong government at the centre which triggered a major revival in consumer sentiment in 2014 saw India rank first in the Credit Suisse Emerging Consumer Scorecard 2015.
In the process, India unseated China, which was the leader in last year’s survey when India was at fourth position.
The fifth annual Emerging Consumer Survey by the Credit Suisse Research Institute profiles consumer sentiment and its drivers across the emerging world providing insights regarding consumer sentiment and future consumption patterns.
The survey interviewed consumers across nine emerging economies including Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa and Turkey.
According to the survey, more people believe this is a good time for making big ticket purchases as average household income in India increased by around 10 per cent in 2014 after being relatively steady the two previous years.
While the rural areas continued to do well in India in 2014, there was considerable improvement in urban India too. “The revival in consumer sentiment has primarily been driven by urban India as parameters such as expectations of increasing incomes, moderating inflation expectations, improvement of personal finances etc. resulted in a sizeable jump for urban respondents. Urban household income also increased at around 12 per cent in 2014 after remaining stagnant for two years.’’
Among the key themes, in e-commerce the share of respondents in India that have used the internet for online shopping increased to 32 per cent from 20 per cent in 2013. Also, the desire to travel more has accelerated most meaningfully in Mexico and India but has slowed in China, Turkey and South Africa.
The survey showed India as having the lowest consumption of beer, meat and cigarettes, the lowest ownership of cars and lowest access to the internet.
“The survey shows the contrasting impact of the oil price collapse on emerging markets,’’ Giles Keating, Global Head of Research for Private Banking and Wealth Management, Credit Suisse said in a statement. “Consumer sentiment in Russia and key Latin American economies is under pressure, in contrast to India where the consumer looks robust, helped by reforms.”
