NEW DELHI: India, in the 13th ministerial conference (MC13) of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) in February, will push for fast-tracking its demand for a solution on public stockholding for food grains, over negotiations on other agriculture-related issues.
“The public stockpiling of food grain is the longest-pending issue. Promise was made by the members in the Bali ministerial conference (in 2013) and then later endorsed by subsequent conferences… without that, we will not take part in any discussion on any other issue on agriculture,” a senior government official said on Thursday.
India wants to seek a permanent solution on public stockholding with more enhanced terms, compared to the 2013 Bali peace clause. Public stockholding programme is a policy tool used by the government to meet food security and safeguard millions of its hunger-stricken population. India has found support from a group of developing nations at the WTO, including Africa.
A solution is crucial since member nations have been raising questions over India’s minimum support price programme for grains, particularly rice, since the subsidy has breached the limit under the trade norms thrice. India has invoked the ‘peace clause’ under WTO norms to protect its food procurement programme against any action from member nations in case the limit is breached.
While some developed countries have argued that public procurement at subsidised rates and storage distorts global agriculture trade, India, on the other hand, has maintained that they have to protect the interest of poor and vulnerable farmers, besides taking care of the food security needs of a large section of the population.
The official, cited above, also said that developed countries have demanded discussion on export restrictions–on items such as wheat–imposed by India.
India doesn’t want to discuss these issues until the resolution of the public stockholding issue, the official added. These countries want discussions on issues such as providing advance information on export restrictions, which will be difficult for India to implement since it wants to protect its policy space for taking actions such as export ban to ensure food security.
India has also conveyed that support measures given by them to its poor farmers like input subsidies such as on electricity, irrigation, fertiliser and even direct transfers are non-negotiable.
Source: Business Standard
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