In a political declaration adopted at their meeting here on the margin of G-8 summit, leaders of India, China, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico asked the developed countries to fulfill their Kyoto Protocol commitment and cut greenhouse gas emissions by 25-40 per cent by the year 2020.
The declaration said the interrelationships of a global economic slowdown marke by financial uncertainty, persistence of trade protectionist distortions, soaring food and oil prices and the threats posed by climate change add complexity to the current scenario.
"The rise in global food prices poses a new challenge to the fight against poverty and hunger.....Multi-billion agricultural and trade-distortion support in developed countries have hampered development of food production capacity in deveoping countries, critically reducing their possibilities of reaction to the present crisis", the declaration said.
The five "outreach" countries of the G-8 summit are also spearhading a key alliance of developing countries in the WTO Doha round of negotiations against heavy subsidies provided by industrialised countries to their rich farmers.
Their demand for a cut in subsidies by developed countries came barely two weeks before Trade Ministers of key WTO members meet in Geneva in a bid to break the stalemate over on the long-stalled Doha round of talks.
