The Centre will send an expert team to the World Trade Organisation headquarters in Geneva next month to ensure that negotiations on food security issues and the proposed global services pact are expedited, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday.
This development follows Ms. Sitharaman’s meeting with WTO Director General Roberto Azevêdo, who is on a two-day visit to India.
During the meeting, Ms. Sitharaman raised the need to ensure that the processes on outstanding issues — including arriving at a permanent solution to the issue of public stock-holding for food security purposes — of the WTO’s Doha Round negotiations are completed before the December 2017 Ministerial Conference (MC) in Argentina.
The Minister maintained that India was against introduction of ‘new issues’ including e-commerce into the formal agenda of the WTO-level negotiations on liberalisation of global trade without consensus among all the WTO Members.
She also reiterated India’s opposition to attempts by some rich countries to work towards a global investment agreement at the WTO-level that would incorporate a contentious Investor-State Dispute Settlement mechanism. Besides, the Commerce Minister said India would consider the proposed multilateral disciplines on fisheries subsidies, provided they ensure that the country’s resource-poor fisherfolk are protected.
Earlier in the day, speaking at a Confederation of Indian Industry-event, Mr. Azevêdo said the WTO’s 2015 Nairobi MC processes were a “disaster,” and asked the global body’s member nations to have greater engagement to ensure conclusive outcomes on issues including those related to food security, services and e-commerce at the December 2017 MC in Argentina.
On the issue of public stockholding for food security purposes, Mr. Azevêdo pointed out that there was a clear and mandated deadline to find a permanent solution by December 2017. He said WTO Members “must redouble efforts to meet the deadline,” adding that New Delhi’s leadership was crucial in this regard as the matter is important for India.
Mr. Azevêdo said India’s proposal for a Trade Facilitation in Services (TFS) Agreement at the WTO-level, aiming to ease norms including those concerning movement of foreign skilled workers/professionals across borders for short-term work, was still at a conceptual stage and members are still awaiting clarifications and more details.
India will shortly submit to the WTO a legally vetted draft on the proposed TFS pact. It will also hold a two-day conference next month on the TFS proposal.
Meanwhile, the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), in a statement said that at a meeting on Wednesday, when some ICC members asked Mr. Azevêdo about e-commerce issues being advanced by a number of countries at the WTO, he confirmed that while there was a lot of interest on the issue, no consensus had been reached on how to move forward.
“Mr. Azevêdo acknowledged that some countries had expressed a number of concerns and reservations. With this in mind, he said it would be important for those countries advocating work on this issue to better define their objectives if they hoped to progress,” the ICC said.
