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\\\\India Welcomes Hong Kong WTO Deal - Delhi TV

Posted on: Sunday, 18 December 2005, 18:10 CST

Text of report by Indian Doordarshan DDTV news channel on 18 December

In today's top story, WTO, of course, where 149 nations have reached a deal at the World Trade Organization Ministerial Meeting in Hong Kong. Negotiators agreed to phase out farm export subsidies by 2013, deliver a development package to the poorest countries, and set a new deadline of April 30th, 2006 to complete the full modalities of the agreement.

India has welcomed the Hong Kong Declaration and the positive outcome of the ministerial meeting. Commerce Minister Kamal Nath has asserted that the deal is one such fully which protects the interests of the Indian agriculture and subsidy. [sentence as heard]

[Correspondent Sharat Chandra] The strategy of a grand alliance of developing countries has paid off. Developing countries have ensured that several of their concerns in agriculture, non- agriculture market access [NAMA], and development issues have found mention in the Hong Kong Declaration. Developed countries have agreed to eliminate export subsidies progressively by 2013. On the crucial issue of NAMA, the concerns raised by India over the first draft have been addressed by ensuring flexibility for developing countries.

[Nath] I am happy to say that from going round and round and round about without seem [as heard] to be setting course towards a development agenda, we need to pick up momentum in the next couple of months. The next couple of months are going to be very important, because we have now reached a structure. Obviously, these are not full modalities but really the contours. Largely, the contours of the full modalities have been defined.

[Chandra] The commerce minister also said the new draft is the result of the unity posed by developing countries at Hong Kong.

[Nath] I think that the unity of developing countries for the first time - the G-20, the G-90, the G-33, and some of you have, were there at the press conference the other day - sent [Nath corrects himself], created the right atmosphere that it will not, as in the past that the texts were written by some, a few developed countries and you had the developing countries having to argue against and literally negotiate with them on almost final text. [sentence as heard]

[Chandra] The Hong Kong Declaration ensures that Indian farmers will continue to receive domestic support and India will have the right to declare an appropriate number of products as special products which will remain outside the tariff reduction formula. The unity among developing nations has paid off. The gains of the Hong Kong Declaration will go a long way in meeting the objectives of the Doha development round. With Swadhin Panda, Sharat Chandra, DD News, Hong Kong. [end of recording]

For an update on WTO proceedings, we are joined by our correspondent Sharat Chandra on phone line from Hong Kong.

[Anchorwoman Sakal Bhat, live] Now Sharat, first of all, as we just mentioned, 149 countries have reached a deal now at WTO. Of course, the major thrust seems to be on the concerns, the agriculture concerns of developing nations. Now to begin with, how critical is it from Indian standpoint?

[Chandra] It's very critical, Sakal. I think it was very critical. India came into this WTO ministerial meeting with a lot of concerns on every front. There were concerns on agriculture. For India, the concerns were not particularly with regard to export subsidy but there were other concerns with regard to special products, with regard to special safeguard mechanisms to ensure that the domestic farmers were protected, and these concerns have been fully reflected in the ministerial declaration that has just been adopted a short while ago. On the issue of NAMA, where industrial tariffs are concerned, again there was a lot of concern about whether Indian industry would be safeguarded and whether we would get the flexibility within the declaration and that has in fact been achieved in the second revised draft, because the first that came out yesterday was found somewhat wanting and a similar concern was even expressed by the commerce minister, but this revised draft in fact gives us flexibility on that count. Sakal.

[Bhat] Right. Now we also heard Kamal Nath saying that contours of the modalities have been defined. What are the salient features in brief, Sharat?

[Chandra] Well, on the issue of agriculture, we have 2013 set as an end date for elimination of export subsidy. We have special products and safeguard mechanisms for the developing countries. On the issue of NAMA, we have flexibilities introduced for the developing countries, and also we have a benchmark established that the ambition in agriculture will be balanced against the ambition in NAMA. In the case of services, again we have the interests of developing countries fully protected, the interests of India also fully protected. India has special, a special offensive interest in services where we are as good as any developed country, and to a large extent, I think, our concerns there have been fully protected. An important thing has been the LDC [least developed countries] development package where substantial progress has been made towards duty-free, quota-free access. On the issue of cotton which - cotton was one commodity which could have thrown these talks into disarray - on the issue of cotton, there have been some latest amendments in the declaration that has finally been adopted and now perhaps even the least developed countries and the cotton-producing, the poor cotton-producing countries of West Africa, perhaps, have reason to feel satisfied with this deal. Sakal.

[Bhat] Right, Now Sharat also, what, how would you attribute this success to? In fact, what would you attribute this success to? Is it the unity amongst the developing nations or the fact that there is a kind of consensus building between developing and developed nations at WTO?

[Chandra] Sakal, I would just like to mention two things, which the commerce minister also said. The first is the unity among over a 110 nations that for the first time stayed for the entire duration of the conference. It was about the third day or perhaps the fourth day when 110 nations came together and those pictures really told the story that this time the developing nations were not going to fall apart, they were going to remain united despite their diverse interests. And the other thing, of course, is that well, you know, India has played a very, a kind of [changes thought], has emerged as a kind of leader bringing together these diverse groups and really ensuring that their interests remain reflected after days of hard negotiations. It is actually the economic architecture, as our commerce minister pointed out, which is changing, which has changed from the Uruguay round to the Doha round, and we had to make the developed world realize this and the developing countries have probably succeeded in telling them.

[Bhat] Right. Right Sharat. Thank you very much for talking to us, of course, from Hong Kong. [end of live relay]

Now back home, industry has welcomed the WTO agreement and congratulated the commerce minister, Kamal Nath, for safeguarding developing countries' interests.

[T.S. Vishwanathan, senior adviser to Confederation of Indian Industry] In the area of industrial tariffs, for instance, I think the flexibilities that have been made available are extremely good. I think the special safeguard measures and the whole sensitive products that have been provided for developing countries in agriculture is [as heard] also an extremely important development. I think the whole safeguards which were necessary for Indian agriculture have been taken care of in this (?list), text which has come out today. [end of recording]

Source: BBC Monitoring South Asia

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