The Hindu : 'Livelihood Box' for WTO parleys mooted

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Feb 11, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Kerala

'Livelihood Box' for WTO parleys mooted

By C. Gouridasan Nair

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM Feb. 10. The M. S. Swaminathan Commission on WTO Concerns has asked the Union Government to propose a `Livelihood Security Box' as an alternative negotiating principle in the coming round of the post-Doha trade talks.

The Commission, constituted by the Kerala Government to advise it on ways to tackle the challenges posed by the emerging world trade regime, has pointed out that the existing Blue, Green and Amber `boxes' do not address the problem of sustainable livelihood of farmers in developing countries who are resource-poor and lack domestic safeguards to protect their livelihood. The Commission, constituted in 2001, had submitted its final report to the Kerala Government.

India should ideally seek abolition of all the existing `boxes' and insist on clear and unambiguous delineation of all the do's and don'ts relating to trade distortion and unfair trade practices. The OECD countries provide subsidies to the extent of $ 1 billion a day to their farmers and these are being adjusted against `Blue Box' payments and `Green Box' measures which are non-actionable, as only `Amber Box' measures are considered to be trade-distorting, the Commission has pointed out.

It has mooted the `Livelihood Security Box' as an alternative negotiating principle in the likely event of the proposal for abolition of the existing `boxes' getting rejected. This box would help empower the developing nations faced with the challenge of providing livelihood to the rural population.

`Since 66 per cent of the population of several developing nations, including India, depend on agriculture for their livelihood, trade which leads to the destruction of rural jobs/livelihood would further increase poverty and hunger and would make the achievement of the U.N. millennium goals in areas of poverty reduction and hunger elimination impossible. The result would be social disintegration because of a further increase in rich-poor divide,'' the report says.

The percentage of population dependent on agriculture should be the major criterion to become eligible for using the provisions of the proposed `Livelihood security box', the minimum being 50 per cent of the population. Noting that the idea of a `development box' had been suggested by a group of developing nations, the Commission says that such a scheme would include steps that would provide market access for the crops produced by low income and poor farmers with higher levels of domestic support in keeping with Article 6.2 of the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA).

The Commission wants the Union Government to avoid categorising the modest help being extended to millions of small farm families as `subsidy'. A range of domestic support measures like those relating to infrastructure development and many other forms of public provisioning are non-trade distorting and hence should be non-actionable. `Support for sustaining farming and rural livelihoods', the Commission thinks, should be the nomenclature for the very modest financial help being extended to small producers who are getting heavily indebted due to the unfavourable cost-risk-return structure of farming.

The Commission points out about drafting of a tariffication code based on the principle of equity and the livelihood security of small farm families. India should seek review and removal of all non-tariff barriers in the way of access to the markets of industrialised countries and secure assistance for the developing countries to improve their capacities in the area of sanitary and phytosanitary measures and adoption of Codex Alimentarius standards of food safety.

Another recommendation is constitution of a high-level committee to review the work of commodity boards. Such a committee should include steps needed to restructure and re-tool the commodity boards to ensure income and livelihood security to small producers and plantation workers who have been affected by the present trade regime. The boards should become catalysts for productivity and quality enhancement and better value addition in plantation crops, the Commission says.

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