Asia Times: India shrugs off US trade warning


	August 23, 2001	atimes.com

India/Pakistan

Delhi shrugs off US trade warning

NEW DELHI - India is standing firm on plans to protect its interests at the World Trade Organization (WTO) ministerial meeting in Doha, Qatar in November - interests also shared by several other developing countries.

India's Commerce Minister Murasoli Maran declared on Tuesday, the second day of a two-day conference on the "Concerns of Developing Countries in the WTO Regime", that India had no fears of being isolated at Doha for pursuing implementation issues pending from the Uruguay Round.

United States Trade Representative Robert Zoellick, who visited New Delhi earlier this month, warned that India could end up being isolated if it opposed fresh talks leading to further opening up of trade at Doha. Zoellick also warned in New Delhi that should Doha end in failure, the "major losers will be members of the developing world".

"India is insistent that implementation of issues that arose out the Uruguay Round in 1994 should be addressed first," Maran said. India and Malaysia have been identified as staunch opponents to a new round of trade talks by industrialized countries that want a new round decided at Doha. The developed nations that want the WTO's mandate expanded include the European Union, Japan and the United States.

But a good number of developing countries believe current problems with the present trade rules need to be addressed first - especially those that hurt their economies - before there can be talk about new issues.

The Malaysia-based Third World Network, reporting on a recent meeting in Geneva to review preparations for Doha, said that there are two categories of problems that developing countries see.

First is "the non-realization of benefits because the rich countries have been tardy in implementing their commitments for opening markets, especially in textiles and agriculture", it said. Second, there are "the problems caused to developing countries when they implement their own obligations, including in intellectual property, subsidies, agriculture and investment measures".

These, along with imbalances in existing WTO rules, need to be corrected first for the trading system to better meet the needs of developing countries, the Third World Network said in a report.

There were some 50 proposals for action on issues relating to implementation of current trade rules, it quoted the Pakistani ambassador as reporting after at a meeting of the WTO General Council in Geneva.

Given the doubts about entering into a new trade round, Maran dismissed the suggestion that India would be isolated. Even if that happened, India was prepared to defend its national interests. For instance, "we cannot pursue policies that will affect our farmers - we are a democracy", he said.

Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee referred to the "incomplete agenda" of the Uruguay round when he opened the conference, but said India would go to Doha with an open mind. Vajpayee said he wanted to see more liberalization in areas such as agriculture. "Expectations that trade-distorting subsidies in agriculture given by developed countries would be reduced have been belied," he said. Indian farmers, he said, did not want to be exposed to "unfair competition from subsidised exports" which he said threatened livelihoods.

Vajpayee was emphatic that there should be no misappropriation of these resources under the Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (IPR), another major feature of WTO trade rules that critics has say has been used against the natural riches of developing countries. He also demanded that the patent applications reveal the country of origin of biological and genetic resources and traditional knowledge used in the products or processes.

Earlier this month, India lost a battle at the United States Patents and Trademarks Office (USPTO) to prevent patentability of the famed long-grain, aromatic basmati rice, which has been grown for centuries by farmers in this country and neighboring Pakistan.

Vajpayee also demanded recognition as a universal right of affordable access to medicines for life-threatening diseases. "The TRIPS [Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights] agreement should enable every member country to take a broad range of measures for promoting health care both preventive and clinical."

Vajpayee said India's position was shared by many developing countries and large sections of opinion within the developed world itself. "The WTO is born into an unequal world. Hence, its first mandate is to help bridge this development gap among the nations of the world. India calls upon both developed and developing countries to collaborate and make the WTO work for the poor," Vajpayee said.

In the run-up to Doha, India has been campaigning along with the Group of 77 bloc of developing countries for a concerted stand on making use of the ministerial round to get implementation issues addressed. "Bringing multiple issues to the table just to get substantial trade-offs and swap concessions advantageous for a few countries without any benefit to developing countries does not augur well for the success of the multilateral trading system," Maran said in a letter to G-77 commerce and trade ministers.

He emphasized that developing countries need to coordinate positions on various WTO-related subjects as full stakeholders, keeping in mind commonality of interests on major issues.

Developing countries are not in a position to take on more commitments and are opposed to the linkage of trade with labor and environmental standards, since they could be used to distort competition and undermine comparative advantages. Maran said he was concerned at the reluctance to "take account of the crisis on patents and drug prices in the WTO and lack of interest and attendance by developing countries of a WTO initiative on technology transfer to developing countries".

As for bringing up new issues, Maran warned G-77 ministers that they should be trade-related and should have been thoroughly discussed so that "we should be able to evaluate its likely impact on the additional rights, responsibilities and obligations and be ripe for such an inclusion".

India has, in the meantime, filed a proposal on easier movement for professionals in the hope of gaining new opportunities for its qualified personnel in global markets.

(Inter Press Service)

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