The Hindu : Most businesses ignorant of WTO review policy

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jun 10, 2002

Business

Business

Most businesses ignorant of WTO review policy

By R. Gopalakrishnan

CHENNAI June 9. Indian businesses have not changed their mindset of taking it easy and doing little research despite their facing a ``threat to survival'' under the globalised trading regime.

This is the loud message from an interaction session here on Friday.

At a meeting called to get a feedback for use by Indian representatives at the Trade Policy Review (TPR) of some of the WTO member-countries and trade partners of India scheduled in Geneva for this year, many participants from the trade and industry side showed evidence of ignorance of what the TPR was all about.

The organisers of the meeting, Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and the Union Ministry of Small Scale Industry represented by the Small Industries Service Institute (SISI), wanted to know the difficulties in finding access (in terms of the agreed regime of the WTO) to the markets of India's trade partners ``scheduled'' to come up for the TPR in the WTO this year.

But none, either from the dais or from the floor, showed any awareness of the fact that the TPRs of some countries listed for feedback are already over. For instance, the TPR of Pakistan was over on January 25, 2002, though some participants thought it fit to ask the government to raise the issue of some Western countries giving trade concessions to Pakistan as a reward for its cooperation in combating terrorism.

The TPR for Slovenia, also featuring in the list presented at the meeting, was conducted on May 13-15. Other TPRs concluded so far this year include those relating to Mexico, Malawi and Gautemala. Grievances against the U.S. in terms of farm subsidy and steel were mentioned, but the fact is the U.S. is not scheduled to undergo the TPR this year!

All this, despite an enormous amount of material being available in the WTO web site as far as the goings-on in the organisation are concerned, while the Commerce Ministry itself has in the past four or five years posted a lot of relevant information with respect to India's WTO strategy on its own web site.

Of course, in the next few months, a few other more important trade partners of India are scheduled to feature under the TPR, which is a process in which all member-countries of the WTO act as the review body, subjecting the representatives of the ``examinee'' country to searching questions and sharp criticism in respect of perceived non-compliance with the world trade regime in letter and in spirit.

As per the tentative WTO schedule for 2002, India itself will be the subject of the TPR on July 19, while the European Communities' (as the WTO refers to the European Union) TPR will be held on July 24-27. Australia (September 23) and Japan (November 6) are other major trade partners of India whose trade policy and practices will be subject to the rotational WTO review process this year.

Many suggestions were made from a rather negative point of view -- on how India, especially Tamil Nadu, should find ways of introducing WTO-compatible subsidies and non-tariff barriers.

But even such an exercise, it seems, would be a major achievement, considering the desperate way in which Tamil Nadu has in its 2002-03 budget afforded sly protection to its industries by violating one of the two basic pillars of the WTO -- national treatment for imported goods -- by imposing discriminatory taxes on imports, and in that process also raised questions about the sovereignty of the Centre and India's own constitutional arrangements.

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