The Hindu Business Line : GoM meet to grasp `state of play' in WTO talks

AS part of the Cabinet Committee on World Trade Organisation (WTO), the Group of Ministers (GoM) on Wednesday met under the Chairmanship of the Defence Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, to acquaint the new Government with the possible stance New Delhi should take in the modalities for negotiations of the various agreements under the auspices of the WTO.

Official sources told Business Line here that the Cabinet Committee on WTO has been reconstituted on Tuesday to reflect the remit of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and the broad trade policy strategy and associated concerns over several agreements and their modalities of which would have to be negotiated in the coming days.

The sources said that at today's GoM "the state of play" in various WTO negotiations was highlighted as also the stance of India on several important areas, including agriculture and non-agricultural market access, besides trade-related intellectual property rights (TRIPs) and other important issues.

Besides Mr Mukherjee, other participants to the GoM included the Union Commerce and Industry Minister, Mr Kamal Nath; the Union Food and Agriculture Minister, Mr Sharad Pawar; the Union Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidamabaram; the Rural Development Minister, Dr Raghuvansh Prasad Singh; and the Communication and IT Minister, Mr Dayanidhi Maran.

Mr Kamal Nath later told presspersons that India was committed to safeguard the interests of its farmers and the broad policy thrust on various WTO agreements would be so fine-tuned as to reflect the country's concern for development.

The Minister is leaving for Brazil on June 11 to take part in the eleventh session of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) in which he is likely to hold meetings with G-20 alliance of like-minded agricultural alliance countries forged by India, Brazil and South Africa prior to Cancun, which helped in presenting a strong case of farm subsidy reduction and export support measures in developed countries. The Minister would also have an opportunity to hold talks with representatives of the US and the European Union during his stay in Sao Paulo (Brazil) on the recent US-EU formula of farm agreement.

The sources said that as the WTO General Council is scheduled to meet in July 2004 to finalise the modalities of agreements for launching the Doha Development Round before the end of the year, New Delhi with a new coalition government in the Centre should be ready to get a grasp of the state of play in the WTO talks so as to achieve efficacious results.