Do not sideline Doha agreement: India to WTO

Nirmala Sitharaman says inequity in agriculture policy between developed and developed world unacceptable

Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday told the World Trade Organization (WTO) that development issues agreed at Doha could not be brushed aside.

Addressing the plenary session of the 10th WTO ministerial conference in Nairobi, Sitharaman said the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) should be respected and advised the trade body to move towards a more equitable international trade structure before taking up new issues.

She also pulled up rich countries for failing to reduce massive agricultural subsidisation in their own countries while demanding subsidy cuts in developing economies, especially India.

Sitharaman had earlier referred to the slow progress on the DDA, adopted during the fourth ministerial conference in Doha in 2001, as frustrating for developing countries.

In her address to trade ministers from 160 countries on the second day of the conference, she said sudden focus on newer issues of limited consensus like export competition by the US-led developed bloc was baffling.

"The manner and haste with which important negotiating meetings are being convened does not inspire confidence,” she added.

She also brought up the issue of agriculture, which is dominating the ongoing conference owing to a schism between the developed and developing blocs over special safeguards and public stockholding of food.

While India has consistently termed special safeguards for developing countries a priority for protecting poor farmers from sudden surges in imports or dips in global commodity prices, Sitharaman declared the support of international groupings like the G-33 and the Africa bloc.

Developing countries have demanded that a provision already existing in Article 5 of the multilateral body’s Agreement on Agriculture be amended to provide them the same benefit that rich countries derive from the special (agricultural) safeguards.

Referring to vested interests blocking the policy, she said, “For decades, a handful of farm lobbies of some countries have shaped the discourse and determined the destiny of millions of subsistence farmers of the developing countries.”

The Trade Facilitation Agreement signed by India in 2014 allows it to maintain its food buffer stocks till a permanent solution is found. But it still cannot export such subsidised food owing to opposition from developed countries alleging it distorts market prices.

A ‘peace clause’ signed with the US that allows India temporary immunity from complaints by other WTO members has been described by India as off the negotiating table.

Rich members at the WTO also oppose India’s food security programme, especially the policy of providing minimum support prices for food crops to farmers, alleging they distort trade prices. However, the same countries have refused to reduce their own massive subsidisation.

Saying such reduction had been the clear mandate of the WTO, Sitharaman said it was surprising the issue was not even a subject matter of discussion.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta had earlier said Africa’s farmers simply could not compete against heavily subsidised farmers in developed countries.

On the matter of services, Sitharaman called for greater liberalisation of services trade, particularly in Modes 1 and 4 under the WTO charter.

While Mode 1 pertains to business process outsourcing, which India wants completely liberalised, Mode 4 negotiations provide for movement of people. Here India has been demanding the bound rate for granting visas for professionals should be substantially increased.

Sitaraman also pushed for a strong package for least developed countries (LDCs) in the form of trade concessions. She said India was the first developing country to extend duty-free quota-free access to all LDCs.

Pointing out that the current ministerial was the first one being held in Africa, she called for stronger integration of LDCs in the global market.

Sitharaman defended the WTO’s multilateral trading system and said plurilateral agreements between countries impinged upon it. India has maintained silence on the recently announced Trans-Pacific Partnership among the US, China and Japan.

However it is working actively on the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership involving China, Australia and the ASEAN countries and is also closely pursuing free trade agreements with a host of countries.