India to send team to Geneva to iron out WTO issues

India will soon despatch a team to Geneva to speed up the process of negotiations to find a permanent solution on food security even as WTO chief Roberto Azevedo asked member countries to "redouble efforts" to meet the deadline of December.
The issues figured in the discussions during a meeting between Commerce and Industry Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Azevedo here today.
She said India wants the procedure of finding a permanent solution to be completed on time and before the ministerial level meet in Argentina in December.
During the meeting, Sitharaman pressed for regular meetings to discuss this important issue. "This year, I want to see discussions happening in Geneva on this. We have already done enough groundwork... We can not start discussions from scratch," she added.

The issue will come up for discussion at the WTO's committee on agriculture in Geneva. The deadline to find a solution is December-end.
Finding a solution is important for India as it would help in smooth implementation of its food security law.

Azevedo said WTO has a clear mandated deadline for finding the solution by the upcoming ministerial meeting in Argentina.
"So, we must redouble our efforts to meet the deadline," he said, adding that the issue is important as this decision protects developing countries from legal challenges at WTO in connection with the governmental support for stockpiling of staple food at guaranteed prices.

He noted that it is particularly important for India, but "there is a lot of work to do".
"So, now what we are trying to do is whether by December, we can come up with a permanent solution for that," Azevedo told reporters here.
He also said the G-33 group of countries, which includes India, has submitted a proposal in this regard with the Geneva-based body.
However, "that proposal has not evolved over time and I am not sure whether convergence can be found on the basis of that proposal without further revisions".
In her meeting with Azevedo, Sitharaman said that unlike

the way "we (WTO members) went not well prepared for the Nairobi (meeting in 2015), I do not want to come unprepared to Argentina. This year, I want to see discussions happening in Geneva in such a way that details are worked out".
"In the course of 11th ministerial conference (in Argentina), you have these 11 months," she said, adding issues need to be discussed threadbare about the public stock holding for food security purposes.
"These are serious issues that we need to discuss threadbare," she said, adding it is not market distorting.
On the fisheries issue, she said no body should deny the policy space of India in protecting the rights of traditional fishermen.

On trade facilitation agreement in services, Sitharaman said the team which will be going to Geneva would work with the ambassador and ensure that the proposal is taken up at various stages.
On e-commerce, she said that the WTO "may have any number of papers...But they are not on agenda for me. I will join for talk but it can't be part of my agenda in the (coming) ministerial meeting because every country has a big churn as regards ecommerce".
It will not be proper for "us to attempt to either regulate or define or get into discussions about what constitutes e-commerce...It shall not be part of the agenda unless all of us agreed and many of us are experimenting on many things on that," the minister said.