India's Saga of Trade Agreements

Despite an excessive interest bordering on desperation displayed by India’s trade negotiators, the outcomes for our country have not matched publicised objectives, and some serious introspection may be warranted, writes Dr. Taradatt, IAS (R)

- 

THE World Trade Organisation (WTO), a unique forum for negotiating global trade rules, governing their implementation, and resolving disputes, came into existence on 01 January 1995 with over 120 countries on board, which soon expanded to 164 covering 98% of global trade.

World trade volume in 2024 is roughly 45 times the level recorded in 1950.

Its legal framework enfolded a daunting 60 agreements (including General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade 1947, now expanded to GATT 1994), annexes, decisions and understandings, covering goods, services and intellectual property rights, with special and differential treatment for developing countries like India. It commits countries to lower, and where mutually agreed, eliminate, customs tariffs and other trade barriers.

Developed countries, or the West, designed rules advantageous to them in multiple ways, negotiating from a position of unmatched strength and knowledge. For instance, Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) included geographical indications to protect their products. Agreement on Agriculture authorised billions of dollars of agricultural subsidies to developed country farmers, but blind-sided the poor farmers of developing countries who eked a miserable living of a-dollar-a-day.

China removed the shackles of GATT's rules-based regime in 1949. Five decades later, having become an industrial and commercial powerhouse, it negotiated very favourable terms of entry to the WTO in 2001 securing even special treatment given to developing countries.