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Government seeks support for its stand on trade talks

The government sought the support on Thursday of other members of a key South Asian regional grouping for its stand against starting a fresh round of world trade talks until past commitments were implemented.

Union Commerce and Industry Minister Murasoli Maran said developing countries were not prepared for new negotiations at the upcoming World Trade Organisation meeting in Doha in November as they had not benefited from earlier agreements and still accounted for just a tiny share of global trade.

"We do not favour taking on board new issues unless there is convergence of views in the membership of WTO," Maran said at a meeting of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation trade ministers.

"It may, therefore, be prudent to confine the agenda to already mandated negotiations and reviews," he said.

SAARC groups Bangladesh, Bhutan India, Pakistan, Nepal, the Maldives and Sri Lanka and was started in 1985 to promote regional economic development.

The SAARC ministers are expected to issue a joint statement on the trade talks at the end of their two-day meeting in New Delhi on Thursday.

India is seen as an influencing voice on the overall stance of developing countries which form three-fourths of the 142-strong WTO.

It accuses rich countries of not fulfilling promises for greater trade access in agriculture and textiles which were agreed upon in the Uruguay round of negotiations between 1986-1994.

"At the time of signing of the Uruguay Round of agreements, welfare gains in the range of $250 billion to $450 billion were projected but in reality there have been hardly any worthwhile gains for developing countries," Maran said.

Maran also said linking trade with issues such as environment and labour standards was not acceptable as it would be used to deny market access to developing nations.

Both the United States and the European Union are keen on a new round but their efforts may come to naught if the developing countries have a unified stand against their move.

The decision for a new round has to be arrived at by consensus, something which was missing in the last attempt in 1999 in Seattle which is remembered more for rioting on streets by anti-globalisation protesters.

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