 Alcohol related problems have emerged as a major public health concern in India, with increase in production, distribution, promotion and easy availability of alcohol coupled with the changing values of society influenced by globalization and liberalization policies. With many parts of the world having reached stable and saturated levels of alcohol consumption, market lobbies of the alcohol industry has been increasingly targeting new potential markets, especially in countries like India. According to Euromonitor – the international agency on global market research on industries, “The Asia-Pacific market holds spectacular potential, specifically because of two very large, extremely underdeveloped markets within the region. China and India holds around 78% of the regional consumer base between them, and both are seeing the development of more open markets. Per capita alcohol consumption is low in both countries and if this can be developed in markets that contain almost 50% of the world population, the potential is massive”.
In the absence of rational alcohol policies and with the wrong notion that alcohol revenues can be used for the development of the nation, the problem has been aggravating alarmingly in India. The timely interaction of the Global Alcohol Policy Alliance (GAPA), represented by Mr. Derek Rutherford and Mr. Oystein Bakke, with medical professionals, public health activists and social workers from various parts of the country, followed by a series of discussions and two important meetings at Delhi (March 2004) and Chennai (June 2004) has resulted in the formation of the Indian Alcohol Policy Alliance (IAPA). |
