India maintains its stand on not supporting an agreement on trade facilitation at the World Trade Organisation (WTO) till its concerns on food security are met, a senior Commerce Ministry official has said.

The issue of trade facilitation did not come up for discussion at all in the Cabinet meeting on Thursday as India’s position on the matter is clear, a senior Government official who did not wish to be quoted as he was not authorised to speak to the media, told Business Line .

The Commerce Ministry, however, did not give an official comment on whether the Union Cabinet took a call on the matter.

“The Government’s position on the matter is clear. India is not going to support a trade facilitation agreement till it is satisfied that its concerns related to subsidies given for food procurement and food aid will be suitably addressed,” the official said. WTO members are expected to sign the protocol for an agreement on trade facilitation by July 31 as per the agreement reached by WTO trade ministers in a meeting in Bali last December. The trade facilitation pact, being pushed by several developed countries, will place commitments on all WTO members to upgrade their border infrastructure and procedures to facilitate movement of goods.

The WTO’s General Council meeting, which was to discuss all countries’ position on the issue of trade facilitation and food security on Thursday, decided to meet again on Friday. New Delhi had recently said in a WTO meeting on trade facilitation that it may not be able to support a pact at the moment as there was not much progress on the issue of addressing concerns related to subsidies given for public procurement of foodgrains and food aid.

The Bali Ministerial declaration had given a short-term relief to developing countries against action by other countries in case it breached the current limit of agriculture subsidies (10 per cent of total production).

India’s fears

India expressed its disappointment over lack of progress in work on finding a permanent solution following the Bali meet. It fears that the temporary solution might be difficult to use as it is riddled with numerous conditions including submission of various data related to production and subsidies.

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