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India's strong leadership led to ending WTO impasse: Sitharaman
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SME Times News Bureau | 22 Nov, 2014
India's strong leadership and negotiating from a position of strength on
the food security issue paved the way for ending the impasse at the
World Trade Organisation (WTO), Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman
said Friday.
"We wouldn't have reached a stage where we can say
that we are closer to a solution and we probably will get over the
impasse. It's only because you were able to as a country stand up with
strength, argue with substance and negotiate with equal rights," she
said at the World Hindu Economic Forum in New Delhi.
"Because of the kind of leadership with which we were able to project India, that is a very big difference," she added.
Sithraman said India's voice is being taken seriously at global institutions like the IMF, the World Bank and G-20.
"It
leads you to be taken seriously.India is now not just seeking high
table, it is being invited to the high table only because the sagging
European and North American economies depend on emerging economies like
India for solutions to revive their economies," she said.
Last
week, Sithraman announced an end to the impasse over the WTO accord to
ease global customs rules, saying an agreement has been reached with the
US on the issue of food stockpiling.
The deal opens the way for a
consensus on the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) which had eluded
the World Trade Organisation members in July.
India has asked for
a permanent solution to the issue of public stockholding for food
security purposes and not a restricted period of four years as was
originally decided during the WTO ministerial meeting in Bali, Indonesia
last year.
India has been under pressure from several countries,
particularly the US, to drop its objections to the Trade Facilitation
Agreement.
India's objections are on the WTO limits on
agriculture subsidies at 10 percent of the total value of foodgrain
production, and on stockpiling foodgrains. Complying with the country's
Food Security Act passed last year that guarantees subsidised foodgrains
to around 70 percent of the population could result in breaching these
limits leading to penalties for India.
At Bali, the ministers
also agreed, by what is called the "peace clause", that till 2017 no
country can move the dispute settlement body of the WTO against another
member if its government was found to be breaching the level of subsidy
freeze that was permitted.
US Trade Representative Michael Froman
has said in statement in Washington: "On the basis of this breakthrough
with India, we now look forward to working with all WTO members and
with Director-General Roberto Azevedo to reach a consensus that enables
full implementation of all elements of the landmark Bali Package,
including the Trade Facilitation Agreement."
While India's
specific proposals have not yet been made public, Sitharaman has urged
the WTO members to take these forward at the body's General Council.
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