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Disciplining domestic support to agriculture remains an unfinished agenda in the WTO negotiations due to the different views and positions of members. Developing members have been consistently demanding an effective special and differential treatment (S&DT) for themselves, along with a substantial reduction in the trade-distorting support entitlement of developed members. However, members have failed to reach a consensus on different aspects, especially coverage and approaches to determine an overall trade-distorting support (OTDS) limit. In this context, this study quantifies and critically examines the implications of various proposals on the policy space to provide trade-distorting support based on floating and fixed reference period models. It estimates trade-distorting entitlements of 9 developed and 16 developing members under the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) as well as the selected proposals for the years 2020 and 2030. These entitlements have been computed in monetary limits, percentage of the value of production, and on per farmer basis. Results show that many proposals have failed to deliver the effective S&DT, as developing members generally have to undertake higher cuts than developed members, highlighting the asymmetries in negotiations. The study will be useful for members to take an informed position in the agriculture negotiations on domestic support.

In the agriculture negotiations, developing members remain concerned about the inherent inequities in the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) which allows developed members to provide huge trade-distorting support without breaching their commitments. As a result of these flexibilities, developed members enjoy artificial competitiveness in international trade, which subsequently leads to an adverse impact on farm income and livelihood security for millions of farmers in third world countries. Further, developing members have been increasingly finding it difficult to implement domestic support measures due to the constraining provisions of the AoA. From the developing members' perspective, the elimination of trade-distorting entitlement for developed members along with special and differential treatment for themselves are the key demands in domestic support negotiations. However, some developed members have tried to build a narrative to depict developing members as major providers of trade-distorting support. This study has made a modest attempt to bring out the fallacy of this narrative by highlighting the asymmetries and inequities in trade-distorting entitlement of 8 developed and 12 developing members based on their socio-economic conditions. Results show that per farmer Amber box entitlement for developing members under the AoA is a mere fraction of the entitlement enjoyed by the developed members. This study provides a different dimension to the ongoing agriculture negotiations to make trade rules development-oriented and inclusive for all. More specifically, this study examine the following pertinent questions (1) whether the relevance of AMS entitlement for developed members has declined, and if so, why are developing members still asking for AMS elimination; (2) in case the socio-economic conditions of the developing members are considered, whether the narrative that developing members have the huge policy space under the de minimis limit will stand; (3) if policy space under the de minimis limit has increased, then why are the developing members complaining about the constraining provisions of the AoA; (4) In case the number of farmers is considered, what will be the entitlement of the members under the amber box for achieving a level playing field. The study seeks to explore answers to these intriguing questions by examining and evaluating the policy space under the Amber box for 20 selected members; 8 developed members namely Australia, Canada, European Union (EU), Japan, Russia, Norway, Switzerland and the United States, and 12 developing members namely Bangladesh, Brazil, India, China, Egypt, Indonesia, Kenya, Pakistan, Philippines, South Korea, Thailand, and Turkey in 2020 and 2030.

This paper assesses key issues in the dispute over the United States’ claim that for certain grains China exceeded its limits on domestic support under the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) during 2012–2015. The panel first determined that the base years for the reference price in calculating China's market price support were 1996–1998, rather than 1986–1988 as stipulated in the AoA, and that production in the geographic regions where the support programs operated, not the smaller quantities purchased at administered prices, constituted eligible production. The panel then found China had exceeded its limits in each of the four years for wheat, Indica rice, and Japonica rice. The possibility was left open that a government can determine eligible production by setting maximum purchases at support prices in its regulatory framework. China used this option to claim that its programs for 2020 implemented the recommendations and rulings of the DSB. We argue that use of outdated fixed external reference prices to measure the price gap and to define eligible production by limits on purchases, distance calculation under the AoA from economic support measurement. The measurement issues compound the discord among Members over levels of agricultural support.

With rising levels of food and livelihood insecurity among poor farmers, many developing members at the WTO are demanding special safeguard mechanism (SSM) for shielding their agriculture from import surges and price declines. Most of developing members do not have any trade instrument under the WTO to address it except by increasing the applied tariff to bound level. Similar to special agricultural safeguards (SSGs) which is available only to few members, SSM seeks to provide flexibility to developing members to breach the bound tariff in special cases of import surges and price dips in order to minimize its adverse impact. In this context, this study identifies the agricultural products facing import surges in selected developing members namely Ghana, India, Indonesia, Namibia, Philippines, Senegal, Sri Lanka, and Turkey. The uniqueness of this study is derived from the fact that it also evaluates the policy space available to selected members on these tariff lines in terms of tariff overhang under their existing schedules as well as proposed tariff reductions under agriculture negotiations. Beside this, it critically scrutinizes various issues such as cross-check conditions, triggers and remedies in order to highlight the sensitivities of developing members in accessibility, effectiveness, and other technical aspects of this mechanism. The study identifies some of the provisions contained in the most recent version of the negotiating texts which could render the SSM an ineffective policy instrument and difficult to operationalise.

The world trade organisation (WTO) has liberalised trade considerably, but there are instances of imbalance and systemic issues persisting although we celebrate two-decade of the existence of this regulatory body. This paper provides insights into how there is a lack of disciplining of WTO compatible non-tariff measures at the multilateral level. It has led to members stretching the use of permissible provisions (Articles 5 and 7) under the sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) agreement, allowing for deviation from international standards and not notifying with HS codes. All these actions, particularly over the last two decades, have increased the level of protection of their domestic industry under pressure from tariff liberalisation and correspondingly led to a rise in protectionism. Especially when the restrictions put on the imports, they are not adequately notified to the WTO. Information asymmetry (of various forms like – the WTO notifications without trade linkage, non-standardised approach to market access, non-codex MRL standards etc.,) is one of the biggest challenges to overcome when it comes to addressing the menace of non-tariff measure created mainly by the SPS and TBT measures. This paper attempts to bring to the forefront some of the imbalances in the global trading arena that have co-existed along with the WTO led tariff alone liberalisation efforts since 1995. To do this, we have analysed ten players in the global arena, considering various strategic consideration for India. In the paper, we have attempted to bridge this by providing what exactly is the level of requirements across ten countries in terms of active ingredients MRL standards. To elaborate on this issue, we have done the mapping of maximum residual limits (MRL) standards on active ingredients as provided by the Global MRL Database for ten countries alongside Codex standards (international). An analysis of the stringency test performed to quantify a comparison MRL standards scenario vis-a-vis the Codex standards for ten countries. The paper highlights the growing importance of MRL standards on active ingredients in determining global players in agricultural exports. This paper also analyses the MRL standards faced by top 33 agricultural products of India in nine markets. Further, there is an attempt to analyse the interface of tariff liberalisation (MFN) with MRL-based SPS standards, which are dominantly present “behind the border”.

The variable import levy for corn imports in the European Union aims to support European producers by insulating domestic prices from low international prices. Such price-insulating policies have been associated with an increase in global market volatility. Eliminating these distortions has been one of the key issues in international negotiations on agricultural trade liberalization, e.g., the commitment of WTO member states to follow the principle of tariffication as part of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture. Nevertheless, the Blair House Agreement effectively allowed the EU to maintain a variable import levy regime for grain imports, although the magnitude of this levy is substantially smaller than in the past. Notwithstanding that this policy has been a cornerstone of the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, empirical evidence on the magnitude of its effects on price volatility is largely missing. This paper employs a multivariate asymmetric volatility model to assess these effects on domestic and foreign corn markets, using Argentina – a large exporter of corn – as an example. In line with the relevant theoretical literature, we find empirical evidence for the 2002–2017 period that the variable import levy reduced corn price volatility in the EU market, while significantly increasing volatility to the same extent in Argentina. In a distorted sense, the import levy of the EU has thus been a success, as its variable application rate has stabilized prices in the EU domestic market. However, our results show that this policy has merely shifted price volatility abroad since it has led to increases in price volatility in Argentina. A less distortionary policy to target the problems of agricultural price volatility should shift its focus away from direct price interventions. For instance, domestic policies that improve farmers’ ability to cope with price-related risks would avoid the negative effects of domestic price stabilization in foreign countries.

The weave of global free market concept is near to death now. Hope for the free market trade was initiated by the World Trade Center (WTO) under its inspiring agreements as a part of multilateral trade negotiations. Several rounds of WTO showed light for free movement of goods, services even manpower from least developing countries to the developed markets. WTO was successful to negotiate a long list of agreements like Agreement on Agriculture, Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade, Agreement on Trade Related Investment Measures, Agreement on Anti-Dumping, Agreement on Customs Valuation, Agreement on Pre-shipment Inspection, Agreement on Rules of Origin, Agreement on Import Licensing Procedures, Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures, Agreement on Safeguards, General Agreement on Trade in Services, Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, Agreement on Government Procurement, and Trade Facilitation Agreement etc. within last three decades. But major challenge bring forward while the agreements started to be enforce in practice. First attract was led by USA who refuses to implement DFQFMA to the LDCs and introduced a condition of 97% products, they had selected these 97% so list of products so comprehensively for the countries that all major export items of the LDC countries like Bangladesh went out of 97%. Various counter proposals were placed and standard, compliance and conditions etc. forms of restrictions made the negotiation complex and time consuming.

The decision of the United Kingdom to leave the European Union has raised many questions, including some on the nature of the trading relationship that the United Kingdom will have with the European Union and third countries once it leaves the EU. For agriculture, the United Kingdom will need to develop its own agricultural policy as it will no longer be subject to the Common Agricultural Policy and one constraint on the development of that policy will be the Agreement on Agriculture concluded at the end of the Uruguay Round negotiations. This article examines the three pillars of that Agreement – market access, domestic support and export competition – to determine the commitments which the United Kingdom may make in each pillar and then looks at two other relevant agreements, the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures and the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade, to complete the discussion of the scope of the United Kingdom’s nascent agricultural policy. Thereafter there is a discussion of the possible principles on which that policy will be based. The paper argues that although a great number of questions have been raised by Brexit, not many answers have yet emerged.

Cotton has been at the centre of international trade from the beginning of the industrial revolution and has played a fundamental role in the development of many countries. This is because cotton is the raw material for textiles which are a fundamental human need. Cotton also serves as a means of livelihood for millions of people around the world who grow it as a cash crop or work in the textile industry. As a cash crop, it serves as an important source of revenue for many governments. From the outset, it is important to state that cotton in international trade can be categorised either as an agricultural product, a textile product or as any other good/commodity. This classification is important because: (a) as an agricultural product, trade in cotton would be subject to the Agreement on Agriculture which applies to ‘agricultural products’ as listed in Annex 1 of the agreement. Under Annex 1, ‘raw cotton, waste and cotton carded or combed’ (under HS headings 52.01 to 52. 03) are listed as agricultural products and therefore under the scope of the Agreement; (b) as a textile product, trade in cotton was also affected/regulated by the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing (ATC). In fact article 1.4 expressly stated that: ‘... the particular interests of cotton-producing exporting members should ... be reflected in the implementation of the provisions of this agreement’. This agreement terminated after the 10th year that the WTO was in force (2005), none-the-less its inclusion of cotton and cotton products such as cotton yarn under an annex of textile product goes to show that indeed trade in cotton was regulated under the ATC as well; (c) as any other good or commodity, cotton is subject to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, the Agreement on subsidies and any other agreement regulating trade in goods. In my submission I will consider cotton as first a good/commodity like any other under the GATT and as an agricultural product and finally as a ‘textile’. It has been shown that in the ATC, cotton yarn was considered as a textile. Additionally under the 1973 Arrangement regarding international Trade in Textiles (commonly referred to as MFA), the expression ‘textiles’ was defined in article 12 to include ‘yarns’. A similar definition is given for ‘cotton textiles’ under article 9 of The Long Term Arrangement regarding Trade in Cotton textiles (‘LTA’). Finally, According to the Oxford English dictionary, the word ‘textile’ means inter alia, ‘... fibrous material such as flax, cotton or silk’.

This study aims to evaluate the distributional effect of the governmental rice policy in Japan on producers, consumers, and government expenditures from 1986 to 2010 using a partial equilibrium model. Policy measures include government purchase of rice, output payment, and acreage control. The simulation result shows that acreage control has been the principal policy measure for transferring income to producers, especially since the enforcement of the WTO Agreement on Agriculture. Acreage control is the policy measure with the lowest total efficiency and highest budgetary efficiency. This result implies that the government’s goal of transferring income to producers with minimum government cost has been achieved through a combination of policy measures.

To ignite the world trade, a number of global economic institutions have been formed to carry out multilateral free trade in the world of multilingual and multi religious community. General Agreement on Tariff and Trade is one of them, which was signed on 30.10.1947. The fundamental aims of GATT were to liberalize world trade negotiations among member countries. Therefore, reduction of tariffs on trade on manufacturers was adopted as major goal of GATT. One of the major activities of the GATT since its inception has been launching of a series of rounds of negotiations. The first one was Geneva Round (Switzerland, 1947) & the last one is Uruguay round (Punta del Este, 1986). Almost in all the rounds some trade related barriers have been tried to remove for free trade among countries.India is one of the signatory of Uruguay Round (UR). The basic thrust of UR Final Act attack was that the Indian government has surrendered its sovereignty under pressure from the US government and the multinationals. There is no doubt that some of the criticisms were politically motivated and value loaded.Any comprehensive analysis of the implications of the Uruguay Round for India would have to cover all-important concerns. However the present study is an attempt to delineate only the major concerns regarding the implication of Uruguay Round agreement for India concerning to Reductions in tariff, Agreement on Anti-dumping, Agreement on TRIMS, Agreement on Agriculture Agreement on Services, Agreement on TRIPS, Agreement on Textile and Clothing, Social causes in GATT, Dispute settlement body. Finally an attempt has been made to suggest the future avenues for further productive dialogues in future ministerial councils.

This paper analyzes the potential impacts of the agreements of Special Products and Sensitive Products (SPs) in Doha negotiations on world and China's Agriculture. By linking a global trade model to a national policy model which itself is connected to a set of disaggregated household data, we are able to assess the effects of the inclusion of SPs into a Doha agreement on agriculture in China and the rest of the world and different farmers across China. Our results show that since the inclusion of SPs in a Doha agreement adds more protection in agriculture, the total quantity of resources used in world agriculture increases. Although increasing, it is important to note that the total rise is only a fraction of a percent of agricultural value added and the gains to rural income per capita are likewise small. Moreover, an important difference between the apparent benefits of SPs is highlighted when they are considered for one country alone and when they are made available to all WTO members. The benefits to agriculture in China (and other countries) from increases in protection resulting from SPs are typically offset when these flexibilities are made available to all countries. While there are some positive benefits for certain vulnerable groups in society (in China), we show that there are adverse effects on equity and the impacts differ largely among regions. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Since the expiry of the ‘peace clause’ at the end of 2003, it has been unclear which obligations under the WTO SCM Agreement apply to subsidies granted to agricultural products. This is in particular important for export subsidies, which are prohibited under the SCM Agreement, but, to some degree, recognised in the Agriculture Agreement. The matter is regulated by Article 21.1 of the Agriculture Agreement, which has been interpreted by the WTO Appellate Body in different ways, including as an expression of the lex specialis principle. This paper analyses this provision, and considers how it affects different forms of agricultural subsidies. It concludes that it would take an extension of the Appellate Body’s current interpretive framework to save export subsidies from the disciplines of the SCM Agreement.

This paper is built on a summary of the findings of a research report, entitled 'European Common Agricultural Policy: An analysis of the main factors affecting its future environmental policy', which aimed to identify and examine the main factors that could influence the development of the environmental policy of the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in the future. After the analysis of different factors that were recognised as being possible influences (e.g. GMOs, Montreal Protocol, Kyoto Protocol etc.) three main factors were identified that could influence policy development; these were: the World Trade Organisation and the on-going negotiations concerning the Agreement on Agriculture, and the expansion/enlargement of the European Union, the greening of the agricultural agenda, including concepts such as rural development and the increasing interest in organic farming. The conclusion reached by the research was that the World Trade Organisation has the potential to cause the biggest influence on the future environmental policy of the CAP. The issue of the enlargement of the European Union was seen as the chance for development of the industry in both the current members and the candidate countries. It was also found that the greening debate will continue to develop and influence policy in the future in combination with the other factors.

This paper examines the economic effects of the trade policies for fresh fruit and vegetables adopted by the European Union (EU) after the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture (URAA). The new import regimes are based on entry prices that in effect work as minimum prices. At the same time, the EU has signed trade preference agreements particularly with Southern Mediterranean countries that are important suppliers of fruit and vegetables to the EU. The management of the import regime is a balance between two conflicting objectives: to support internal producers and to preserve trade flows from preferred countries. On the side of export subsidies, to handle the reduction commitments under the URAA the EU has introduced rationing trough tender procedures. The analysis shows that such subsidies do not seem able to boost the exports of eligible products. Therefore, EU policy makers should ask whether the EU should continue to offer such subsidies.

Transparency, one of the basic pillars and fundamental norms of a well-functioning trading system, is increasingly seen as an inevitable tool in the governance of international trade. Without transparency, trade agreements are just words on paper. Transparency allows economic actors and trading partners to see how rules are implanted, reformed and implemented. For subsidy control, one of the most debated and ambivalent areas of international trade, it is more necessary than ever. The World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (ASCM) establishes disciplines on its Members’ use of subsidies and provides extensive means for reporting and monitoring. Transparency in subsidization has increased considerably in the last two decades. But the transparency mechanism has been criticized for deficient attention, underperformance and impetus to implementation. Members comply with transparency obligations only half-heartedly. Lack of incentive for notification and sanction for non-compliance, resource constraint, ambiguous notification-template and inherent difficulties of the subsidy regime have been great obstacles for transparency to work. Experiences from the WTO Agreement on Agriculture and the Technical Barriers to Trade show that well-defined provisions, collaborative approach and capacity building for increased domestic reporting are necessary for the system to run smoothly. Civil society and NGO involvement may also contribute positively. For transparency to control subsidy, negotiators must think carefully about the government behaviour they wish to modify using the mechanism. The future of the WTO as a legitimate and effective international organization will depend, in short, on finding a mode of transparency accessible to all its Members.

Agri-environmental policies are increasingly being used to redress the balance between jointly-produced agricultural and environmental outputs, and are permitted by the Uruguay Round (UR) agreement with the general provision that they not distort trade. In this paper we argue that any market consequences of efficient, welfare-enhancing agri-environmental policies should not be considered trade-distorting. To consider them so is inconsistent with economic efficiency and with ecological integrity. Social cost-benefit analysis (CBA) is a more appropriate test and guide of trade-consistency for agri-environmental policies, and using trade effects as the test may not enhance social welfare. Moreover, specific provisions in the UR agreement restricting payments under agri-environmental policies to opportunity costs are not warranted on economic efficiency grounds, and consign the environment to a status subsidiary to agricultural output.

This paper examines the role of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture (URAA) in agricultural trade policy reform in South Asia and policy options for the future reform agenda of the World Trade Organization (WTO). A key policy inference is that, to be effective, planning for freeing agriculture should involve simultaneous reforms of import and export regimes, and domestic production support mechanisms. Policy related lending, in particular provision of financial support for social safety programs, can play an important role in making such comprehensive reforms politically palatable and feasible. While overloading the WTO with matters that fall beyond its purview may be counterproductive, there is certainly a case for a coordinated effort involving the WTO and international development finance institutions.

Net food importing countries in the South are identified as losers of the Uruguay Round, having to face both rising prices for imported food and falling prices for tropical agricultural products. Cereal prices have already increased dramatically since the signing of the Agreement on Agriculture. In line with official decisions the World Trade Organization is presently exploring ways to help these countries. Based on Sir Hans Singer's understanding of the role of food aid, this paper proposes a compensatory Food Import Facility administered by the World Trade Organization to help net food importers in accordance with the Agreement on Agriculture.

At the core of the European Consensus on Development is the eradication of poverty in the context of sustainable development, which includes pursuit of the Millennium Development Goals. Under the Consensus the EU is to take account of the objectives of development cooperation in all policies that it implements which are likely to affect developing countries (Policy Coherence for Development), and this includes the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). This paper examines the contribution which could the made to Policy Coherence for Development by the negotiations for a more development-friendly Agreement on Agriculture in the World Trade Organization. It examines the negotiating position adopted by the European Union (EU) in these negotiations from the launch of the Doha negotiations in 2001 up to the production of the latest Modalities for a new Agreement in December 2008. It also contrasts the approach taken by the EU to reform in the cotton sector within the EU with its position in the negotiations on cotton in the sub-Committee on Cotton. This suggests that the opportunity presented by current reform of the CAP to promote greater Policy Coherence for Development will not be fully realized.

Developing a sound agriculture sector is often seen as an engine for promoting economic growth that leads to poverty reduction. Despite Africa being endowed with natural resources, trade in agriculture is still a challenge in light of the international policies and market trends coupled with competition faced with developed countries’ heavily subsidized agricultural products on the global market. The decreasing prices for agricultural products, due to high productivity growth in other parts of the world often supported by subsidies and protection particularly in developed countries, have weakened export earnings and intensified competition between foreign and local products. This has led most African countries, particularly the least developed countries (LDCs) to lament that provisions under the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) are fraught with inequalities in that they have practically allowed the developed countries to highly subsidize their agricultural products to the detriment of the developing and LDCs thereby leading to agriculture trade distortion. Despite commitments aimed at reducing tariffs, domestic support, and export subsidies, according to developing and LDCs, various loopholes in the AoA in fact reinforce inequities whose effect is that Africa’s agriculture sector cannot properly compete on the global agricultural trade. This article critically assesses the trade distorting provisions under the AoA and whether the removal of trade distorting subsidies by developed countries would enhance Africa’s trade in agriculture. Furthermore, it analyses whether the AoA gives enough flexibility to developing and least developed countries to use their domestic agricultural policies to enhance their quest for global trade in agriculture.

Concern over budgetary costs has been the traditional driving force behind changes to the EU's Common Agricultural Policy. While the recent MacSharry reform of this policy was more related to external pressures arising from the need to reach an agreement on agriculture in the GATT Uruguay Round, many expect the budgetary constraint to re-emerge towards the end of this decade, particularly in the light of the impending accession of a number of Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs). This paper argues that it is unlikely that there will be any budgetary need to further reform Europe's agricultural policy to accommodate the CEECs. Applying the agricultural guideline to estimate resources and using a simple forecasting model of FEOGA Guarantee budget expenditure, the paper demonstrates that, under a range of plausible assumptions for the key variables affecting resources and expenditure, a significant positive margin should emerge between available resources and the cost of EU agricultural policy by the beginning of the next decade. This margin should be sufficient to pay the estimated costs of extending the present CAP to the CEEC countries without further significant reform. However, even though the budget cinstraint on EU farm policy may disappear, other factors, such as GATT disciplines and concern about agriculture's impact on the environment, will remain as pressures for further CAP reform.

This paper considers the detailed implementation of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture by the European Union (EU), and its likely impact on the CAP. The Agreement sets three constraints to agricultural support in developed countries. The commitment to reduce domestic support by 20 per cent will have no effect. Tariffication and the new access provisions will only marginally improve the competitiveness of imports into the EU in the short-run, but do set the scene for more meaningful tariff cuts in the next Round. It is the constraints on subsidized exports which will most limit the CAP, and impact on world markets, although even here the effects could easily be exaggerated. The export constraints will bite deeper in the longer run, particularly in the context of an enlargement of the EU to embrace several states from Central and Eastern Europe which could trigger a more fundamental CAP reform. Despite its limited impact, the Agreement should be judged a success in that it does impose limits on the CAP and sets the scene for the next Round of negotiations, proposed to begin in 1999.

This paper examines the basic provisions of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture on domestic support and their relative importance, especially from the perspective of developing countries. It gives some indication of the extent to which difficulties may arise from differences in interpretation and implementation of certain provisions, which may result in contentious issues in the future. Further, the paper focuses on the implications of the commitments made for food and agricultural policy in developing countries. In particular, it discusses in some detail the compatability of the new disciplines with agricultural and food policies normally pursued by developing countries. Although, by and large, developing countries have provided small amounts of direct price support to agriculture in the past, the paper concludes that, in general, the Agreement on Agriculture per se is not likely to present serious constraints to them in pursuing their agricultural and food policies on production, consumption and domestic market stabilization. In most cases constraints are likely to come from budgetary austerity and commitments that countries have made under Structural Adjustment Programmes.

This paper examines the implications of the Agreement on Agriculture for the rice economy, and reviews its impact on world rice production, trade, consumption and international prices. The Agreement is potentially beneficial for the international rice market, and especially for developing countries. Considerable uncertainties, however, exist as to whether the full benefits will be realized, as they hinge mainly on the implementation of market access provisions in a limited number of countries. Tariffication as it finally evolved under the Agreement would not result in any significant expansion in trade, and international trade in rice would remain distorted up to the year 2000 as the level of export subsidies in some countries could well remain above that in 1986–1990. In assessing the impact of the Agreement, the paper assumes that there will be full compliance with the commitments made. Some alternative scenarios are also examined.

This paper reviews changes in the global trade policy environment as a result of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, and their potential impact on developing countries and economies in transition. The Agreement is, except in a few cases, not likely to present these countries with major policy adjustment problems. In Latin America, unilateral reforms have proceeded further than required by the Agreement. In Africa, countries that have experienced structural adjustment are liberalizing faster than the Agreement requires. In Asia the situation is mixed, but in general agricultural trade liberalization appears to be moving more slowly, especially when compared to Latin America; progress in reducing quantitative restrictions has been show. In Eastern Europe and the CIS, the progression and completeness of liberalization varies widely, though GATT notions of tariffication and tariff bindings have strengthened the position of reformers in those countries that are members of the WTO. While the short term impact of the Agreement may be modest, the bringing of agriculture under the rules of GATT should help prevent reintroducing non-tariff restrictions in the future. However, given that much of the food imports, particularly in parts of Asia, are still conducted by parastatals, if state trading in GATT-legal it is hard to anticipate how strong discipline on trade distorting support could be brought about.

The paper presents FAO's assessment of the Uruguay Round on world agricultural markets and the food security implications of such effects for developing countries. The analysis is based largely on FAO's World Food Model, which is used to compare the outcome for the year 2000 with and without the implementation of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture. Although at the global level market effects for most agricultural commodities turn out to be small, the effects are relatively more important for the low-income food-deficit developing countries, especially with regard to their food import bills. The paper concludes, however, that the food security prospects of developing countries are largely determined by underlying factors which the Uruguay Round would not alter to any substantial degree.

This paper examines the EU's plans for implementing the Uruguay Round GATT Agreement on Agriculture with respect to fresh fruits and vegetables. It considers the import access, export subsidy and domestic support commitments. In particular, the EU has decided to retain a minimum import price regime for fresh fruits and vegetables. The new entry price system, displacing the old reference price system, is to apply on a consignment basis. The entry price and reference price systems are compared, and some conclusions drawn about the likely impact of entry prices on potential Third Country suppliers of the EU market.

Empirical research lends support to the idea of a, "multi-speed globe," of differentiated (fragmented) constitutionalisation, rather than a fully-fledged integrative constitutional process. "Variable geometry," on the global scale could acknowledge irreconcilable differences between nation states.A prominent candidate for one fragment of this variable global constitutionalisation is the World Trade Organization (WTO). Constitutionalisation of the WTO means an evolution from constitution to constitutionalism within this organisation.A core constitutional issue is the public interest. The concept of, "public interest," can be used in various ways. Exception and limitation clauses play an important role in the constitutionalist reconstruction of international law.The WTO is so far only modestly constitutionalised, but could and should be further constitutionalised. Further constitutionalisation of the WTO should comprise the following reforms: upgrading non-trade concerns such as the environment in the treaty language itself, liberalisation in trade sectors in which poor countries can compete, empowerment of individuals by enabling at least indirect participation in secondary law-making (parliamentary dimension) and dispute settlement (direct effect), streamlining of the decision-making and law-making processes by reviving the legally available options for majority voting and judicial review of WTO acts.

The study seeks to examine the impact of the WTO's agreement on agriculture (AoA) on Sri Lanka’s agricultural trade performance. It is found that under the AoA regime, Sri Lanka’s share in the world’s total agricultural trade has increased. The importance of farm trade in the country’s overall foreign trade has improved. Further, evidence suggests that Sri Lankan agriculture has opened in new economic environment. In new trade order, value of Sri Lankan farm exports has grown faster than that of imports resulting into significant expansion of trade surplus. The normalised trade balance in agriculture has enhanced dramatically.Furthermore, the study finds that in the emerging liberalised farm trade order Sri Lanka’s comparative advantage is much better than other leading farm producers especially in the exports of: tea, copra, coconuts and natural rubber. For food grains Sri Lanka heavily relies on imports. In the WTO trade negotiations, Sri Lanka may press for an effective and substantial cut in developed countries protective measures and trade distorting agricultural subsidies, in order to safeguard and enhance its food production capacity.

Many Sub-Saharan African countries are highly dependent on the agricultural sector for the livelihood of the population. Agriculture is source of livelihood for 64 percent of the population in the region; the sector contributes about one-fifth of total gross domestic product, and about 12 per cent of the total export earnings for the region. These countries are gifted with abundant land, labor and natural resources indicating existence of comparative advantage in the agriculture sector. With the existence of comparative advantage, one can reasonably expect the continent to be able to feed its citizens. However, food security is of particular concern to many Sub-Saharan African countries and a daily problem for large parts of the population. Many of the countries which faced recurrent food shortage for the period 1998-2002 are found in Sub-Saharan Africa.Food security of a country is affected by different factors; one of which is international trade policy. Trade policy reform resulting from the WTO negotiations involves a combination of the three pillars of the Agreement on Agriculture: tariff, domestic support measures and export subsidies. Each of these pillars have one way or another an implication on food security. Lowering of tariff in agricultural products would lead to an increase in import and declining of price of imported goods thereby enhancing food security. However, for a continent like Africa, where more than 64% of the population depends on the sector, the negative consequences could out weigh. The rules on domestic support and export subsidy also have an impact on food security in that their removal will increase the price of food in the world market there by increasing the import bills of food importing countries and decreasing the amount of food supply to food deficit countries in the form of food aid. The removal of support, however, is beneficial in the long run as it would enhance competitiveness of agricultural products from African countries. In light of the fact that trade policy plays a great role in the food security of countries, the issue deserving consideration is the effect of the WTO agricultural trade liberalization on food security and the available mechanisms for addressing the issue.The article examines the food security implications of the WTO agreement on Agriculture. It asserts that the Agreement on Agriculture favors agricultural producers of the developed countries at the cost of producers in developing countries, including Africa. The article will also address the extent to which the realization of the objectives of the Agreement on Agriculture will promote food security in food insecure African countries. Accordingly, the next section will define food security and look into the state of food (in)security in Sub-Saharan African countries as well as the causes for food insecurity. The third chapter touches upon the three pillars of the AoA and their implementation and will also discuss their relationship with food security. The fourth section will highlight the state of affairs in the current negotiation and indicate the reforms necessary to be undertaken under the current round of negotiation which aims towards enhancing food security in the region. The paper will finalize by making some concluding remarks.Presented at the SIEL 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

The traditionally unique status of agriculture as an exception to an otherwise increasingly liberalized, international trade regime has become a key challenge in defining the future of the World Trade Organization (“WTO”). Domestic agricultural production in the United States has been protected since the New Deal era, and has seen rekindling during various farming crises spanning to the present day. Protectionism in the agricultural sector is often justified by factors that do not resonate with the general scheme of trade in manufactured goods. On political grounds, states desire self-sufficiency in order to avoid become a political subservient to trading partners who control their citizenry’s food supply. The particularly harsh conditions of a free-trade market in agriculture also compels those states to seek price stabilization measures in order to insulate their domestic farmers from volatility in the international markets. As a result of this predilection for preserving domestic agriculture, the sector has been largely exempted from the WTO’s blanket goals for trade liberalization. However, the WTO’s reduction commitments were one of the major achievements of the Uruguay Round.

Agriculture plays a critical role in the majority of African Countries’ economy. The sector is not only a major employer but also a significant source of export earnings and hence it has a high multiplier effect. This very fact makes agricultural market access issues of major concern to African countries.This paper aimed at assessing the agricultural market access challenges of African countries through reviewing pertinent literature, WTO Agreements on agriculture (AOA) and the Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures and recent developments at the Doha round of trade negotiations.While through the adoption of the AoA, WTO members have brought agricultural trade to a new phase of remarkable reform, African agricultural exports still face significant challenges (both tariff and non-tariff). Particularly, African small holder farmers’ exports hardly penetrate into major export markets due to ever increasing complex nature of SPS measures administered by those markets although a number of preferential market access regimes are available to them. It also appears that the Doha round, on the basis of the different modalities in motion, offers little to most of African countries, leaving “aid for trade” as an important supplementary policy for the round to be pro-development, as it purports to be. Presented at the SIEL 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

Export subsidies have for long been decried in international trade. While they have been among the highly prioritized disciplines in multilateral trade legislation negotiations under the WTO, not much headway has been made regarding establishment of clear delimitations of their regulation. The ongoing WTO negotiations touching on export subsidies have not changed much the difficulty regarding the pivotal questions as to whether they should be totally proscribed and, if not, how then to ensure that they are not abused by those with the capacity to do so. At the moment, major trading blocs remain heavily engaged in export subsidy programmes which, despite the inexactness of the obtaining statistical computations, it is agreed, continue to have international trade distorting effects. In the politicization of rationale and justification advanced by the major trading blocs in WTO multilateral negotiations in defence of continued export subsidy provisions, developing and least developed nations continue to bear the brunt as they remain far outmatched as a result of their inability from resource constraint to up the sale of their own agricultural goods on the international market with comparable export subsidy programmes of their own. With an already dismal percentage of a share in international trade and having the world’s poorest economic base, Africa particularly remains perhaps the block most affected by continued export subsidies. This paper seeks to highlight that the prevalence of export subsidies from major trading blocs, make a mockery of the underlying legal ethos within the WTO framework for the need to help developed nations raise their standards of living through a free and fair international trade machinery, and that for Africa in particular, this situation is unsustainable if these underlying goals the WTO ostensibly wishes to achieve as part of its broader aspirations are not to be put to a lie.Presented at the SIEL 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

Trade in agriculture is linked to a whole range of economic, environmental, societal and future interests. For this reason, international regulation of trade in agricultural goods is highly contentious. While mainly directed towards an opening of markets, the WTO Agreement on Agriculture also has some entry points for ‘non trade concerns’. However, the agreement still looks like a casual patchwork that allows rather unsystematic ally for exemptions, without explicitly exposing the grounds that allow for them. The question arises of how the agreement could be drafted in a more structured way, in order to make sure that the economic objectives are efficiently pursued, and at the same time that human rights and environmental concerns are adequately taken account of? The concept of sustainable development provides for a methodical ‘seven step’ framework that gives guidance on integrated decision making processes. In this paper, this framework is partially applied to the Agreement on Agriculture. This working paper served as an introductory note to a brainstorming workshop on the subject that took place on 27 March 2009 at the World Trade Institute, University of Bern.

This contribution offers an overview of the current as well as potential future obligations on export credit support for agricultural products under the Agreement on Agriculture and the SCM Agreement. The US – Upland Cotton rulings have not only shown that such disciplines are actually in place, yet they are also in line with – and even go beyond - the obligations imposed on direct export subsidies for agricultural products. Even negotiators seemed surprised by this jurisprudence as they were unintentionally drafting more flexible rules instead of more rigid ones on export credit support for agricultural products in the Doha Round. This contribution explains that the latest draft on the table would, however, impose additional disciplines that are clearly stricter than those imposed on direct export subsidies but, at the same time, fails to equalize the level playing field among WTO Members and is hard to read in a coherent way.

Measures aimed at addressing climate change raise legal issues regarding the relationship between WTO Law and international environmental law and the relationship between various WTO Agreements. This paper first examines emerging climate change policies that are likely to raise issues in WTO law. The remainder of the paper analyzes several unresolved issues in WTO law that may affect the WTO-consistency of measures that are likely to be taken to address climate change. How should the WTO deal with environmental subsidies under the GATT, the SCM Agreement and the Agreement on Agriculture? Can the general exceptions in GATT Article XX be applied to other agreements in Annex 1A? Are processing and production methods are relevant to determining the issue of 'like products' in GATT Articles I and III, the SCM Agreement and the Antidumping Agreement and the TBT Agreement? What is the scope of paragraphs b and g in GATT Article XX and the relationship between these two paragraphs? What is the relationship between GATT Article XX and multilateral environmental agreements in the context of climate change? How should Article 2 of the TBT Agreement be interpreted and applied in the context of climate change? The paper explores these issues.

The current study analyzes the competitiveness of Indian agriculture in the context of the WTO regime. The efficiency indicators in the context of exportable hypothesis indicate that in the emerging liberalized farm trade order India’s export competitiveness is much better in commercial crops. The results of present study reflect that, at the margin, resources are more efficiently utilized in the cultivation of gram and rapeseed/mustard than in the cultivation of wheat at current levels of technologies and prices, and India has vast export potential if Agreement on Agriculture (AOA) able to remove developed countries trade barriers and to withdraw domestic support to their agriculture. To generate adequate exportable surplus, India must maintain and enhance its production efficiency. The technology upgradation and infrastructure development are key domestic measures for enhancing competitiveness of Indian agriculture.

This paper examines the role played by India in the negotiations at the WTO platform post-adoption of the 'Agreement on Agriculture' and its agenda for future. The chapterization of the paper is as under: (I) Introduction (II) Agreement on Agriculture: Basic Tenets (III) Agriculture: Post Uruguay Developments (IV) Agriculture under WTO: Participation of India (V) India, Agriculture and the Hong Kong Ministerial Conference (VI) Indian agriculture: Beyond Hong Kong

Indian agricultural has been hit hard during post WTO period (1995 - 2003). The share of agro goods in India's global export has declined during this period. During post WTO period, agricultural subsidies of developed countries have been rather increased. Therefore it is very difficult for India to face global agricultural competitiveness. In this scenario, the global agricultural trade would likely to become oligopolistic. The returns of various crops have declined due to increase in cost of production, slow growth of agricultural productivity, weak marketing mechanism, increase in input intensity and fall of water table. As a result farmers have become highly indebted and are resorting to suicides. In the near future also the total quantum of exports particularly agriculture and light manufacturing goods can not be raised significantly in the global market in the near future because of limited and uncertain domestic export surplus and particularly their inelastic demand at world market. In other words, Indian exports were considered to be supply constrained and also were not responsive to relative price changes at the global level. Raising the level of productivity and quality standards to internationally competitive levels is one of the major challenges following the dismantling of quantitative restrictions on imports, as per the WTO Agreement on Agriculture.

This paper examines the case for special and differential (S&D) treatment for developing countries within the WTO Agreement on Agriculture and the particular instruments or exemptions it should contain. The S&D treatment currently allowed to developing countries in the Agreement and the use they have made of it is first described. The range of proposals put forward by developing countries (and by development NGOs in developed countries) is summarised, and the S&D provisions in the August 2004 Framework Agreement for Establishing Modalities in Agriculture are outlined. The reasons why developing countries want special and differential treatment under the AoA are discussed. Some of the main proposals in the Development Box are then reviewed in the light of the justifications presented by its proponents. The paper concludes that the potential exists in the Framework Agreement to take a significant step towards “operationally effective and meaningful provisions” for S&D treatment. While noting this positive outcome, the important objective for developing countries of gaining a reduction in the trade-distorting support and protection by developed countries should not be forgotten. Classification

Article 13 of the WTO Agreement on Agriculture, known as the 'Peace Clause', precludes most WTO dispute settlement challenges against a country that is complying with the Agreement's liberalization commitments -- until 1 January 2004, when the Peace Clause will expire. This article evaluates the strength of the main legal theories likely to be used in challenges to EC and US agricultural subsidies after expiry of the Peace Clause, and then employs economic techniques (regression analysis and equilibrium modeling) to meaningfully apply the soundest legal theories to economic data about agriculture trade. We conclude that when the Peace Clause expires, many commodity-specific EC and US agricultural subsidies will be vulnerable to legal challenge under Articles 6.3(a)--(c) and 6.4 of the WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures. The remedy would require that such subsidies be withdrawn or that appropriate steps be taken to remove their adverse effects. Non-subsidizing developing countries can be expected to bargain in the shadow of this legal vulnerability, demanding that the Community and the United States commit to further subsidy reductions and a shift toward tariffs-and-decoupled-payments systems, in exchange for extension of the Peace Clause. Copyright Oxford University Press 2003, Oxford University Press.

This study examines the Agreement on Agriculture under WTO, issues arising out of its implementation, the process of Doha Round of mandated negotiations, various country/group positions, developing country perspectives and provides suggestions for future negotiations. The Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture has not achieved the extent of liberalization it was supposed to. The heavily subsidized agriculture sectors of most developed countries tend to distort world agricultural trade patterns and adversely affect the developing countries. The Doha Ministerial Declaration had set up guidelines and deadlines for formalizing modalities for the process of negotiations, none of which were met. The last phase of the current negotiations culminated into the Fifth Ministerial Meeting held at Cancun in September 2003, which ended without a Ministerial Declaration. The widely divergent country positions on Agriculture are considered as one of the reasons for the failure of the Fifth Ministerial.Given the set back at Cancun and the need to make progress on trade liberalization, any prescriptions for further negotiations requires a significant analysis of the positions of different countries/groups. Our analysis shows the support levels to agriculture remains very high in the developed countries and these support levels are distorting world agricultural markets for major commodities. This sets in a chain of adverse effects on the agricultural sector and in turn on the livelihood of a large number of farmers in the developing countries. Continuation of current agricultural policies of the developed countries, therefore, could disturb the political and social equilibrium in the developing countries. There is an urgent need to establish a level playing field through reductions in agricultural support levels in the developed countries in order to ensure realization of benefits of trade liberalization to farmers of the developing countries. For this purpose, a definite time frame needs to be established for effecting major policy reforms to reduce the agricultural support levels. Elimination of export subsidies and blue box support, substantial reduction in amber box subsidies and limiting green box subsidies within the next five years will enable achieving level playing field and encourage developing countries to effectively engage in the ongoing negotiations.

One of the great achievements of the Uruguay Round (UR) was to begin to bring agricultural policies into the mainstream of GATT discipline. Non-tariff barriers to agricultural imports were tariffed and bound and are scheduled for phased reductions, and farm production and export subsidies also are to be reduced, mostly between 1995 and 2000. That UR Agreement on Agriculture, together with the SPS Agreement (to limit the use of quarantine import restrictions to cases that can be justified scientifically), the new policy notification and review requirements, and the Dispute Settlement Agreement (which has greatly improved the process of resolving trade conflicts), ensure that agricultural trade will be much less chaotic in future than prior to the formation in 1995 of the new World Trade Organization (WTO). However, much remains to be done before agricultural trade is as fully disciplined or as free as world trade in manufactures. This mid-way point in the UR implementation period is an appropriate time to examine what has been achieved to date, to evaluate what remains to be tackled when WTO members come back to the negotiating table in 1999, and to decide on the most effective ways of ensuring that the process of reform continues or accelerates as we move into the next millennium. Action is needed on numerous fronts simultaneously. The first priority is to secure an early commitment to begin a new round of multilateral trade negotiations at the turn of the century, and one that is comprehensive enough to allow inter-sectoral tradeoffs. The second priority is to ensure all possible areas for opening agricultural markets are on the table. In addition to reductions in production and export subsidies and bound tariffs, this includes expanding tariff-rate quotas, de-monopolizing state trading enterprises, and phasing out special safeguard provisions. Agricultural exporting countries also have a clear, if indirect, interest in ensuring a continuation and spreading of rapid industrialization in densely populated Asia and elsewhere, for that will expand those developing countries' net imports of farm products (especially if WTO commitments prevent them from raising food import barriers). That in turn depends heavily on advanced economies honouring and then extending their commitments to liberalize markets for manufactures, especially cars, textiles and clothing. It also depends on socialist economies in transition (most notably China) reforming sufficiently to be welcomed into WTO membership.

This paper attempts to assess the incremental external financing requirements occasioned by changes in world food prices, due to implementation of the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, for a sample of 57 developing countries. Based on estimates of changes in food prices due to the Round obtained in previous studies, and on detailed data on food trade by country and commodity, the present study shows that the increase in net food import costs are likely to be smaller than 4 percent of net food imports over a period of six years for the countries considered, although for some of the larger trading nations the effect may exceed US$10 million.

Multilateral trade rounds have stressed converting non tariff barriers to simple tariffs. The WTO Agreement on Agriculture includes the "price-gap" method that was prominent in the Uruguay Round. Many agricultural products, once considered commodities, are in fact differentiated products with Klein-Leffler price premiums linked to quality and other characteristics. This paper employs an hedonic pricing model to measure the shadow-prices of differential characteristics in peanuts that enter international trade. This shadow prices must be accounted for in the tariffication exercise to produce the least distorting tariffs.