India has told its partner countries fighting for a permanent solution against challenges to their food security initiatives at the World Trade Organisation that the “currently designed’’ interim relief was unacceptable to it.
The official reinforcement of its stand on the politically sensitive issue at the meeting of G-33 countries just a day before the three-day meeting of trade ministers kicks off in Bali sets the tone for the tough talks that lay ahead.
With developed country members led by the US and the European Union unwilling to budge from their offer of just a four-year peace clause giving short term legal relief against breach of subsidy levels, a pact seems difficult, a Commerce Department official told
“It is difficult for us to accept an interim solution as it has been currently designed. Till such time that we reach there (a lasting solution), an interim solution which protects us from all forms of challenge must remain intact,” Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma said at a meeting of the G-33 in Bali on Monday.
The G-33, led by Indonesia, has been insisting on a change in WTO rules on agriculture that bring food procurement from poor farmers to feed the poor under a subsidy cap fixed at 10 per cent of farm produce. It has also been demanding a change in the methodology for subsidy calculation that is still based on a price index of 1986-88 and does not factor in inflation.
At stake for developed countries is an agreement on government procurement that seeks to smoothen the flow of goods across borders. The agreement would place obligations on member countries to upgrade infrastructure and clear shipments within a given time-frame.
Also on the table are agreements on tariff rate quotas for agriculture export and a package for Least Developed Countries. India has already demonstrated its willingness to go along with the package to help LDCs with the Union Cabinet clearing a proposal to increase duty free quota free access to its markets from the current 85 per cent to 96.2 per cent.
WTO members are in Bali to carve out a small deal from the extensive package of issues under the Doha round of negotiations launched over a decade ago in a bid to breathe some life back into the stuck talks.