The road from Doha

THE WORLD TRADE Organisation's meeting at Doha has been quickly followed by claims and counter-claims about what the agreement on a negotiating agenda means for India. The truth, as always, lies between the Government's claims of ``a positive outcome'' and the Opposition's allegations of a ``surrender''. The one unambiguous verdict that can be delivered is that, considering the array of forces ranged against India, it was the best possible deal for the country. It was not the perfect result, but it could have been much worse if it were not for the position taken by the country's negotiators. It is to the credit of the Union Commerce Minister, Mr. Murasoli Maran, that India defended its trade interests to the very end and agreed to join the consensus only after it felt the agenda had been sufficiently modified to reflect the country's concerns. This is in spite of concerted efforts by many abroad to paint India as the villain of Doha that came close to ``wrecking'' the meeting. It is therefore wrong for critics like the former Prime Minister, Mr. V. P. Singh, who as Commerce Minister in 1986, signed on to a GATT negotiating agenda that gave the world the TRIPS agreement, to now hurl the accusation of capitulation at the Government.

But all that is in the past for, the agreement at Doha was only about what has been colourfully described as ``the end of the beginning'' - a decision on an agenda for further trade talks at the WTO that has taken more than three years to finalise. The more difficult and vastly more important job of actually negotiating new agreements on a number of subjects will now begin. India's interests will therefore be better served by a domestic debate that focuses on what position the country should take at these WTO negotiations rather than one that is full of recriminations about what happened and did not happen at Doha. Of the many trade liberalisation issues on the agenda, the most important from India's point of view will be four: industrial tariffs, agriculture, services and the environment. The challenge in the first three areas is to find the right balance between protecting the interests of domestic producers and at the same time persuading export markets to provide more opportunities for Indian exporters. The fourth issue, environment, a non-trade issue, comes up for negotiation at the WTO for the first time. While the agenda here is narrowly defined, there is the danger that it could be the thin end of the wedge of protectionism. One should not forget that what was merely supposed to be, according to the 1986 agenda of GATT, a discussion on ``counterfeit goods'' finally led to the monster of TRIPS covering intellectual property in pharmaceuticals, integrated circuits, plant varieties and geographical appellations. There are other issues on the agenda, like the outstanding implementation concerns, anti- dumping duties, a review of the TRIPS agreement and of the controversial dispute settlement process, that will make enormous demands on India's negotiating skills at Geneva during a period that will surely last longer than it has taken to decide on the agenda.

Two processes in the past have caused problems for India. One is a lack of consistency between domestic policy and the negotiating stance at the WTO. The other is a political debate that has frequently muddied rather than settled the waters about the issues involved in the negotiations. Finally, Doha showed that developing country unity at the WTO can be a very fragile one for, India found that when it came to the crunch, few countries from Asia, Africa or Latin America wanted to remain in an alliance that had been built up over the years. It may be necessary therefore to develop a new strategy that is based more on an identification of India's economic interests and is inclusive of both rich and poor countries. China has followed such an approach and its formal entry into the WTO will perforce persuade India to think on the same lines.

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Section  : Opinion
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