India’s Unincorporated Non-Agricultural Sector: ASUSE 2025 Findings

Subject: GS 3: Indian Economy

Context: Recently, the National Statistics Office (NSO) has released, for the first time, comprehensive district-level estimates of India’s unincorporated non-agricultural sector.

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About the Unincorporated Non-Agricultural Sector

• It covers small and informal business establishments operating outside the incorporated corporate sector and constitutes an important component of India’s non-farm economy.
• Data Source: The estimates are derived from the Annual Survey of Unincorporated Sector Enterprises (ASUSE) 2025, providing a more disaggregated picture of enterprise concentration, employment, women’s participation and productivity.
• Coverage: The report provides estimates for 757 districts, strengthening the availability of sub-State-level statistics for decentralised and evidence-based economic planning.
• Three Sectors: ASUSE covers establishments engaged in:
  • Manufacturing
  • Trade
  • Other Services
• Ownership Structure: It includes proprietorships, partnerships, cooperatives, societies and trusts; Limited Liability Partnerships (LLPs) are excluded.
  • Limited Liability Partnership (LLP): Governed by the LLP Act, 2008, it combines partnership flexibility with limited liability and has a separate legal identity from its partners. 
  • Since LLPs are incorporated entities, they are excluded from ASUSE’s unincorporated-sector coverage.

Key Findings from ASUSE 2025

• Concentration of Activity: The top 10 districts account for around 10% of the sector’s total establishments, workers and Gross Value Added (GVA).
  • GVA represents the value added by a producer/sector to the economy and is calculated as Value of Output − Intermediate Consumption. GVA per worker is commonly used as an indicator of labour productivity. 
• Top 50 Districts: Nearly one-third of establishments, workforce and GVA are concentrated in the top 50 districts, spread across 12 States.
• District-Wise Scale: Around one-third of districts have more than 1 lakh establishments, whereas nearly 9% have fewer than 10,000.
• Mega Concentrations: Only 16 districts have more than 5 lakh establishments each—8 in West Bengal, 3 in Maharashtra, 2 in Gujarat and 1 each in Karnataka, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh.
• Productivity: In 280 districts, GVA per worker is above the national average of ₹1,56,539. Another 331 districts record GVA per worker between ₹1 lakh and ₹1.5 lakh.

Women in the Unincorporated Sector

• Workforce Participation: Women constitute at least one-third of the workforce in 237 districts.
• Female-Dominated Employment: In 25 districts, women account for more than 50% of the workforce.
• Female Entrepreneurship: Districts in Telangana, Manipur, Meghalaya and Mizoram show particularly high female participation in enterprise ownership and employment.
• Mizoram: Female-owned proprietary establishments constitute at least 50% of establishments in every district of the State.

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ASUSE 2025- Coverage & Methodology

• Sampling Framework: The survey follows a multi-stage stratified sampling design.
• Rural First-Stage Units: Census villages; in rural Kerala, Panchayat wards are used.
• Urban First-Stage Units: Urban Frame Survey (UFS) blocks.
• Ultimate Units: Individual establishments constitute the ultimate stage of sampling.
• Data Collection: Information was collected through Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI) using tablets, largely based on a monthly reference period.
• Geographical Coverage: Estimates are available for 757 out of 770 districts in the sampling frame used for ASUSE 2025.

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