WTO and Indian Agriculture

Abstract

A mini-Ministerial negotiation meeting at WTO was held on July 21-29, 2008 at Geneva to achieve a breakthrough in Doha round collapsed. The ongoing debate over agricultural trade liberalization focuses on how best to eliminate policy distortions that arise from price supports, producer subsidies, import protection and export subsidies. Although the most recent attempts to reach an agreement under the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) have been unsuccessful to date, the push for greater trade liberalization is unrelenting so it seems that further reform of the world agriculture market is inevitable. The WTO Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) has far-reaching implications for the global farm trade and economic prospects of developing and least developed countries. The book is useful for the students and researchers of economics, agricultural marketing, commerce, business administration and law. The book is also worthwhile to: policymakers, planners, trade development agencies, opinion makers, negotiators, practitioners and all those interested in the elimination of rural poverty and welfare of Indian farmers in enriching their understanding of the impact of WTO on pattern of world farm trade, India's comparative advantage in farm trade, intricacies of the WTO rules and present state of Indian agriculture vis-avis WTO obligations.

Keywords: World farm trade, Indian Agriculture, Subsidies, WTO, Comparative advantage, Competitiveness, Aggregate measurement of support