Economics of Consumption and Consumer Demand for Gold in India

Gold has a special place in the economic world as a wealth storage and, for a long time, as a measure of a nation's economic power and the cornerstone of international monetary regimes. The price of gold has risen rapidly in recent years around the world. This paper discloses about the trend and growth of world gold jewellery consumption and consumer demand for gold in India. The objectives of the present study are: To study the gold jewellery consumption of various countries. To find out consumer demand for gold in India To assess the trend and growth of trend and growth of world gold jewellery consumption and consumer demand for gold in India. This study follows the empirical research. In order to analyse the trend and growth of world gold jewellery consumption and consumer demand for gold in India, percentage methods, co-efficient of variations, linear trend and compound growth rate have used. The secondary data collected through the internet, books, newspaper, journals records and brochures. The mean consumer demand for gold bars in India for the 17 years was 131.42 tonnes with standard deviation of 67.66 tonnes. The value of the coefficient of variation specifies that the gold bars performance was relatively stable over 17 years compared to the jewelry demand and coins in India. It is seen that the trend coefficients of the two components were found to be statistically significant at 5 percent level and they are positive. It indicates that, on an average, the world gold jewellery consumption and consumer demand for gold in India have increased at the rate of 5.36 percent and 7.34 percent per year respectively. The higher growth rate was observed in consumer demand for gold in India than in world gold jewellery consumption. The compound growth rates are 0.77 percent and 6.53 percent for world gold jewellery consumption and consumer demand for gold in India respectively.