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India to go slow on agricultural talks as US seeks tariff cuts |
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NEW DELHI: India is likely to go slow on agricultural talks with the US after Washington sought greater market access through tariff cuts for its apples, almonds, walnuts and whiskey. The import duties for these items are at the ceiling level, bound by India at the World Trade Organization.
The video conference of the agriculture joint working group has been put on hold for the time being with India having very little to seek besides market access for grapes, which is a non-tariff issue.
There have been two video conference meetings for intellectual property rights and 'investment in manufacturing' last month before the visit of US President Barack Obama.
"We are still evaluating if there should be a third video conferencing or not. On the agri side, there's hardly anything we are seeking besides grapes. They, on the other hand, want tariff reduction on many items, which cannot be sorted out via bilateral video conferencing as import duties are not US-specific," said a government official.
All these items have a ceiling duty, with walnuts at 100 per cent, fresh apples 50 per cent, and whiskey 150 per cent. Almonds have a specific duty of Rs 100 per kg. These duties make American agricultural products uncompetitive in the market.
Of the $13.8 million worth of apple imports by India in 2013-14, only $0.05 million came from the US. A mere $0.14 million worth of almonds were imported from the US. India and the US formed three working groups during the trade policy forum (TPF) in November --IPR, investment in manufacturing and agriculture.
US assistant secretary of commerce Holly Vineyard is expected to visit New Delhi to discuss bilateral issues sometime in March. "They have not mentioned the level to which they would like a reduction, but have asked for a reduction in a gradual manner," he said.
Besides tariff reduction, US has also raised certain non-tariff issues, seeking market access for poultry and pork. The two countries have already been battling out the poultry ban imposed by India in 2007 at the WTO. The multilateral organization in its October order had asked India to lift the ban on account of avian influenza, calling it 'unscientific' and non-compliant with WTO rules, which New Delhi has appealed against. Besides, India does not allow pork or meat fed with meat, blood or bones.
India has been seeking withdrawal of non-tariff barriers for grapes as US can become a big market for India as it exports at a different time than the top grapes exporters such as Chile and South Africa. "Potentially US can become a very big market for us as we have a natural advantage of producing grapes when others are not," he said.
India had has put in place all necessary sanitary and phytosanitary measures to ensure that quality of grapes match standards sought by US authorities. Currently, EU is India's
Source : economictimes.indiatimes.com
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