In some issues, the divide still appears clear — in textiles and clothing, and some of the newer issues debated in the WTO, for example — and developing countries have organized themselves into alliances such as the African Group and the Least-Developed Countries Group.

In many others, the developing countries do not share common interests and may find themselves on opposite sides of a negotiation. A number of different coalitions among different groups of developing countries have emerged for this reason. The differences can be found in subjects of immense importance to developing countries, such as agriculture.

This is a summary of some of the points discussed in the WTO.

The WTO agreements, which were the outcome of the 1986-94 Uruguay Round of trade negotiations, provide numerous opportunities for developing countries to make gains. Further liberalization through the Doha Agenda negotiations aims to improve the opportunities.

Among the gains are export opportunities. They include:

fundamental reforms in agricultural trade

phasing out quotas on developing countries’ exports of textiles and clothing

reductions in customs duties on industrial products

expanding the number of products whose customs duty rates are “bound” under the WTO, making the rates difficult to raise

phasing out bilateral agreements to restrict traded quantities of certain goods — these “grey area” measures (the so-called voluntary export restraints) are not really recognized under GATT-WTO.

In addition, liberalization under the WTO boosts global GDP and stimulates world demand for developing countries’ exports.

But a number of problems remain. Developing countries have placed on the Doha Agenda a number of problems they face in implementing the present agreements.

And they complain that they still face exceptionally high tariffs on selected products (“tariff peaks”) in important markets that continue to obstruct their important exports. Examples include tariff peaks on textiles, clothing, and fish and fish products. In the Uruguay Round, on average, industrial countries made slightly smaller reductions in their tariffs on products which are mainly exported by developing countries (37%), than on imports from all countries (40%). At the same time, the potential for developing countries to trade with each other is also hampered by the fact that the highest tariffs are sometimes in developing countries themselves. But the increased proportion of trade covered by “bindings” (committed ceilings that are difficult to remove) has added security to developing country exports.

A related issue is “tariff escalation”, where an importing country protects its processing or manufacturing industry by setting lower duties on imports of raw materials and components, and higher duties on finished products. The situation is improving. Tariff escalation remains after the Uruguay Round, but it is less severe, with a number of developed countries eliminating escalation on selected products. Now, the Doha agenda includes special attention to be paid to tariff peaks and escalation so that they can be substantially reduced.

(b) Inflow of FDI in India

Apart from being a critical driver of economic growth, foreign direct investment (FDI) is a major source of non-debt financial resource for the economic development of India. Foreign companies invest in India to take advantage of relatively lower wages, special investment privileges such as tax exemptions, etc. For a country where foreign investments are being made, it also means achieving technical know-how and generating employment.

The Indian government’s favourable policy regime and robust business environment have ensured that foreign capital keeps flowing into the country. The government has taken many initiatives in recent years such as relaxing FDI norms across sectors such as defence, PSU oil refineries, telecom, power exchanges, and stock exchanges, among others.

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