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Union commerce and industry minister Murasoli Maran said India would seek the integration of textiles and garments into the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs system before 2005, as proposed by the present Multifibre Arrangement (MFA).

Reflecting a distinct hardening of India's stance on opposing non-trade issues in the World Trade Organisation agenda, Maran said labour standards were being used as a smoke screen to hide the erosion of competitive advantage.

Speaking at a seminar organised by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci), Maran said trade was seldom the cause for environmental degradation and feared that developing countries might use it as a "Trojan horse'" for perpetuating protectionism.

 

The minister said, "For those environmentalists, who care more for turtles and dolphins, I would borrow the campaign manifesto of US President Bill Clinton and ask `Should we not put people first?'"

Maran added India would not repeat past errors at the Seattle meet and would adopt a constructive approach to reap economic benefits from multilateral trade. Maran said India's first priority would be to take a close look at the implementation of existing WTO pacts. Expressing regret on the growing subsidies given by industrialised nations to agriculture, Maran said any declaration that did not make specific reference to the problems of large, predominantly agrarian economies would not be acceptable.