In India, the gold and jewellery market, already valued at USD 44 billion in 2023, is expected to streak ahead at a faster pace than other sectors of the economy to reach USD 134 billion by 2030 (Maximise Market Research 2024). As this volume shows, the gold sector remains largely dominated by small and medium-sized businesses. This is as true of trade as it is of industrial production.

Although it is difficult to estimate the number of jewel and gold traders in India due to the sector's fragmented and unregistered nature, trade groups estimate there to be 500,000–600,000 units, of which, according to the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council, 86,000 are registered for tax purposes (WGC 2022). But in many cases in the gold economy, production and trade are hard to distinguish in practice: gold traders may themselves be producers or directly in control of production, or they may commission production from others, and the gold sector remains dominated by small, independent shops and workshops. Many of the latter are ‘unorganised’ and not registered with the state, though they may be known to local business associations. In West Bengal alone, for instance, a knowledgeable member of the Swarna Shilpo Bachao Committee, a local trade association for goldsmiths and gold jewellery merchants, reported that the association had approximately 10,000 members. Gold ornament trading is going through rapid differentiation, however. A World Gold Council (WGC) study published in 2022 showed that while in 2017 fewer than 10 per cent of retail stores operated as registered, organised and large-scale facilities, by 2022 they had grown rapidly to 15–20 per cent (WGC 2022).