Upset over the delay in Doha Round negotiations, India on Thursday asked the European Union to inform the US that an early successful conclusion of the global trade deal depended on the rich nations cutting subsidies to their rich farmers.
Speaking at the India-EU business summit here, Indian commerce and industry minister Kamal Nath told EU trade commissioner Peter Mandelson that ?tell your American friends that India will not negotiate on subsistence farming… I have told them (the US) that we will have a deal if they reduce subsidies even by a dollar. But there has been no response.?
?We do need, as much as the EU and the US, a rule-based multilateral system,? he said, adding that the US and EU should respect India?s sensitivities of having over 600 million of its people engaged in subsistence farming. Nath said the final global trade deal should not be about perpetuating the existing inequities. On his part, Mandelson said Europe is ?well aware of the growing weight on the other side of the table (developing countries) on Doha negotiations?.
