WTO farm goods paper raises India's hackles

India and other developing countries are expected to oppose a set of proposals issued by the chair for the Doha agriculture negotiations on Friday over the number and treatment of special farm products, the principal demand of the G-33 coalition, trade diplomats have said.

The chair for Doha agriculture negotiations, Ambassador Crawford Falconer, circulated the working documents on different elements of the market-access pillar that include the treatment of special farm products.

Falconer suggested a tiered formula on how to cut the number of farm products that have different duties.

He suggested five tiers in which he proposed a cut between 32.2 and 34.6 per cent for farm products with tariffs between 0 and 30 per cent; 36.6 and 40 per cent for products having tariffs between 31 and 80 per cent; 41.3 per cent and 43.3 per cent for products having tariffs between 81 per cent and 130 per cent; and 44 per cent and 48.6 per cent for products with tariffs of more than 131 per cent.

He said the centre of gravity for "default" special products, which would be sheltered from the tariff-cut formula, would be roughly half of the cuts in each tier. The chair proposed two categories for treating special products.

In the first category, a minimum of [7] (square brackets imply there is no consensus yet) per cent of tariff lines up to a maximum [12] per cent of tariff lines may be sheltered from the application of the tariff cut formula.

For these products in the first category, he suggested a minimum cut of between [10] per cent and [20] per cent and a maximum cut of [20] per cent and [30] per cent and provided that the average of that cuts is at least [15] per cent and [25] per cent.

The effective cuts for the special products in this category will be between 15 per cent and 25 per cent, the average of the cuts being 20 cent.

The chair also suggested a second category of special products that would include between [2] per cent and [5] per cent of tariff lines for which the proposed tariff cuts would be between zero and [10], [15] per cent and the overall average cuts must be at least [5] per cent to [10] per cent.

This would imply that developing countries can have a tariff cut of between 0 and 12.5 per cent for about 3.5 per cent tariff lines provided the average of the cuts is 7.5 per cent.

Ambassador Falconer also suggested other flexibilities if members chose not to have the above flexibility.

In an initial response, a developing country negotiator from the G-33 coalition told Business Standard they would oppose the "stiff" treatment for special products when it comes up for discussion tomorrow.

The G-33 coalition, led by Indonesia and India, seeking enhanced flexibilities for certain farm products from the tariff-cut formula, had suggested a "hybrid" approach in which they pressed for designating 20 per cent of all farm tariff lines as special products.

In a proposal submitted to the chair on December 17, the G-33 coalition demanded zero cut for about 40 per cent of all special farm product tariff lines on a self-designation basis, 8 per cent cut for 30 per cent of special product tariff lines and 12 per cent for the remaining 30 per cent tariff lines.