India to pitch for SSGs in agriculture

India will ensure that it has access to the special safeguards (SSGs) mechanism that would allow imposing additional duty in case of a surge in imported agricultural products or a fall in the import prices at the Hong Kong ministerial conference in December, G K Pillai, additional secretary, Union ministry of commerce and industry, said.

Speaking at a seminar on 'WTO and India: A Roadmap for Hong Kong Ministerial Conference', Pillai said, the Hong Kong conference has trickled down to negotiating primarily agriculture trade and being a ministerial one is legally binding on the 148 member countries.

The SSGs in agriculture till now have been the right of only some World Trade Organisation (WTO) member countries that include about 21 developing countries.

Reacting to developed countries' claim for reduction of domestic agricultural subsidies, Pillai said, real cuts are not really cut subsidies. For instance, the European Union offers a subsidy of 66 billion euros to its agricultural sector. But even a 50 per cent reduction on the scheduled (allowed) subsidy of 114 billion euros would come to 57 billion euros, a real cut of only 9 billion euros.

"The primary aim of India would be to get substantial reduction in domestic subsidies of developed countries and see to it that all export subsidies are eliminated by 2010," Pillai said, adding, the bargain for developing countries would be to offer reduction in tariff.

In his address, S Narayanan, former ambassador to WTO, said, "Being a member of WTO, we have to accept certain obligations. But it would be difficult if one were not a member and were to bilaterally negotiate with each trading partner."