Piyush Goyal says WTO agreement on agriculture tilted against developing countries
Piyush Goyal said G-33 must work for positive results on a permanent solution that caters to public stockholding for food security purposes.
Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on September 17 said the WTO agreement on agriculture is favouring the developed countries and have tilted the rules against many developing countries, which is riddled with deep imbalances. While addressing the G-33 virtual informal ministerial meeting, he said that historical asymmetries and imbalances must be corrected to ensure a rule-based, fair and equitable order. From a total of 47 G-33 members, 21 representatives from countries like India, took the floor to make the brief intervention.
G-33 coalition should be retained and strengthened
Goyal in his intervention said that G-33 must work for positive results on a permanent solution that caters to public stockholding for food security purposes, which is of prime importance. Also, Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) should be finalised quickly and a balanced outcome is needed on domestic support.
The minister urged the members to collectively work on retaining the cohesion of the G-33 coalition and further strengthening it by garnering support from other like-minded developing countries to get support for a fair, balanced and an outcome which is development-centric on agriculture at the 12th conference in Geneva.
The meeting came to a conclusion, with the adoption of the G-33 joint ministerial statement reassuring the commitment for expeditiously resolution of the WTO’s mandated issues in agriculture.