Resumo de World Trade Organization And India: Some Insights

I find it strange to be reviewing my own book. Thank god it is really not a review but an abstract. This book has been brought out by Quest Publications, Mumbai in 2005.

This book by me is in fact a collection of my articles that were published in various economic journals and trade journals of repute in India during the recent years. My experiences while working under the Ministry of Commerce as well as my Ph.D. thesis related to international trade followed by a ten year stint as the Executive Head of the World Trade Centre, Mumbai, have given me the impetus to write on WTO and India. I was fortunate to get a Foreword to the book from Mr.Rubens Ricupero, former Head of the UNCTAD, Geneva.

Undeniably GATT was a somewhat loosely knit entity whereas its successor the WTO that was born on 1 Jan 1995 brought in more structure and systems. The WTO was heralded in with much fanfare. The rich nations condescendingly told the poor nations that they (the poor nations) would draw immense benefits from the new entity. What was envisaged was ?freer trade?. (The word ?free trade? is meaningless because if world trade were totally free from import duties, at least the industry and economy of poor nations would at once collapse). So what was envisaged was the scaling down of import duties and the abolition of import quotas. The developed countries wanted the developing countries to steeply reduce their import duties.

The WTO brought in some Agreements in certain new areas such as Intellectual Property and Trade in Services in which areas the rich nations were stronger and therefore stood to gain more. The developing nations therefore became cautious in their bargaining and in their negotiations in course of time.

An Agreement on agriculture was also a new feature of the WTO that did not exist during the GATT days. However the rich western nations have done pretty little to cut down agricultural production subsidies and export subsidies. This has infuriated the poor countries where the economy is predominantly based on agriculture. The quota on textiles was a protection allowed for the rich nations till 2004. All these things have created distortions affecting the poor nations.

Tariff peaks and tariff escalations, technical barriers, anti-dumping and several such practices adopted by the developed countries have been affecting the exports from the poorer countries. Undoubtedly the WTO has been beneficial for all the partners but it can be said that it has benefited the richer countries more in actual practice notwithstanding the fact that the real intention was to bring in greater slice of prosperity to developing countries.

My articles written before the Doha Meet and the Cancun Meet of the WTO Ministerial, turned out to be somewhat prophetic. The delegations from India and the other developing countries began learning their lessons only from the Seattle Ministerial. They refused to take things lying down and would not be browbeaten by the developed West. The new Singapore Agendas (Trade facilitation; Transparency in Government Procurement; and Investment and Competition Policy) were going to further burden the poor countries. This came only as a late realization by the poor countries and therefore these new areas are in a sort of limbo. It is not that the poor nations are not prepared for reforms but their problem is with regard to the over-exigent time frames that are being dictated by the developed countries.

The book also deals with several other areas such as the need to bring ?crude oil? under the effective control of the WTO so that cartels such as the OPEC are outlawed which alone can be of help to the poor countries that do not have oil; Indo-Latino American Trade; Indo-African Trade; Indo-Chinese Trade: the importance of Counter Trade etc.

The book in a sense raises the basic issue: ? When will the rich nations learn to give something to the poor??

by Dr.V.S.Gopalakrishnan

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