India wants its concerns over Uruguay Round addressed

By Amit Baruah

JAKARTA, MAY 30. India says it is ``anxious'' that its implementation-related concerns on the Uruguay round of trade negotiations are ``addressed satisfactorily'' before a new round of World Trade Organisation negotiations takes place.

Addressing the XI G-15 summit's opening session, the Vice- President, Mr. Krishan Kant, said today that there were several implementation problems relating to various Uruguay Round agreements and decisions.

``Especially in the field of agriculture, there is the problem of export subsidies provided by the developed countries to their agricultural exports, while the developing countries are prohibited from giving any new export subsidies.

``In the mandated negotiations on the WTO Agreement on Agriculture, India has articulated its concerns in areas of domestic support, market access, export competition and food security. Furthermore, a large agrarian economy would need enough flexibility under the agreement to take care of its food security, rural employment and livelihood concerns,'' the Vice- President said.

The G-15, he said, must resist the linking of trade with core labour standards and environmental issues, competition policy and NGOs' involvement in WTO negotiations.

Referring to the digital divide, one of the themes to be addressed by G-15, Mr. Kant said the divide was created by unequal access to information technology. ``Collective global action is required to bridge this divide. This divide is not only a technological divide, it is a knowledge divide. It is a language divide, gender divide, purchasing power divide, rich- poor divide.'' It was important for the developing countries to present a unified viewpoint on issues of digital divide.

India would be happy to share its experience in information communication technology (ICT) and its applications with developing partners through avenues such as the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) programme.

``India would like to make the offer of 50 training slots in ICT to candidates from G-15 countries during the current financial year. Similarly, we wish to learn from the successful experiences of other countries in the field,'' Mr. Kant said.

``The Jakarta Declaration on Information and Communication Technology for Development (to be issued tomorrow) rightly stresses the need for a common vision and adequate and timely cooperation to bridge the digital divide. India welcomes the establishment of a G-15 task force on ICT and looks forward to actively participating in its deliberations and work programme,'' he said.

On HIV/AIDS, he said access to essential drugs was of critical significance. ``Essential care should be made available on an affordable basis to those who need it. Availability of resources is a major constraint in many of the developing countries.

``International institutional funding for vaccine research needs to be encouraged, covering all sub-types of the AIDS virus. Any resulting patent arising out of such research should be held in public domain so as to enable all countries of the world to manufacture the vaccine. India has also suggested the setting up of a global drug facility, on the lines of those set up to combat leprosy and tuberculosis, for HIV/AIDS also, with liberal contributions from bilateral and multilateral donors and drug companies, both multinationals as well as generic manufacturers... There should be universal support for expanding availability of such drugs to developing countries,'' the Vice- President said.

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Section  : International
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