Mini Wal-Mart wanted

The franchise stores established in rural areas in the past two years are actually no different from the variety shops run by local farmers. Wang found out in many franchise stores, commodities are placed on the shelves without any order, sanitation in those stores is relatively bad and many stores haven't priced their goods in a standard format.

More importantly, the delivery efficiency of rural franchise stores is relatively slow. Many of the stores have even sold food that has expired. Wang said if things continue like this, it would be hard to control the quality of the commodities.

"Large supermarkets in urban areas place their commodities in an orderly fashion and have an enjoyable shopping environment, while rural franchise stores fall short in terms of management and operation," Wang pointed out.

Wang said many rural stores are poorly managed although they are part of a franchise brand.

"The rural market condition is not standardized," Wang acknowledged.

Domestic retailing giants like Wu Mart, Jingkelong, and Chaoshifa have sped up opening new stores in rural areas, but the rural areas in the relatively developed eastern part of China are their first choices. The rural areas in the eastern part constitute a small part of the overall rural area in China. Therefore, more supermarkets with advanced management and operation should be introduced into all rural areas so as to provide farmers with convenience and deliver advanced knowledge to farmers to change their outdated operational concepts.

"If Wal-Mart opened small franchise supermarkets in villages, they would be welcomed by local people," said Wang Hemin.

As for the existing rural stores, they should advance their delivery efficiency. Wang said their inspection found out that 40 percent of stores around major transportation lines can enjoy delivery from suppliers but those without convenient transportation cannot get delivery directly from suppliers. This leads to high transportation fees. Therefore, even though farmers have significant consumption power, they cannot get what they want immediately, which indirectly constrains their consumption power.

Wang said most of villages have formed goals to establish one or two major retailers in local markets.

Considering that's the case, Wal-Mart may want to get a head start into these markets before Carrefour does, or vice versa.