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India : WTO To Hear Indo-EU Textile Dispute On July 8 & 9 |
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2003-7-3 8:33:00
A World Trade Organisation (WTO) panel will again orally hear both New Delhi and Brussels on July 8 and 9 in their dispute regarding the European Union’s generalised system of preferences (GSP) scheme. Under the scheme, the Pakistani textile sector has been getting a special tariff arrangement from the Union, which has been denied to the Indian textile industry. Earlier, the panel, set up at New Delhi’s instance on January 27 this year, had orally heard both the parties on May 14 and 15 in the case.
Textile ministry officials say the special tariff arrangement extended to Pakistan under the three-year GSP scheme from January 1, 2002 is primarily aimed at enabling Islamabad to combat drug production and trafficking. Textiles secretary SB Mohapatra had expressed serious concern over this during his bilateral talks with the EU representatives in Brussels on May 7.
Leading an official delegation for the talks, Mr Mohapatra had also
referred to EU trade commissioner Pascal Lamy’s recent statement in New Delhi that Pakistan was likely to “graduate beyond the threshold level of its exports to the Union in the near future”. This implied that Pakistan was likely to become ineligible for duty-free access of its textile exports to the Union, he had stated.
The textile secretary had also brought home the point that the
15-member Union was continuing with its import curbs on Indian textile products under the WTO agreement on textiles & clothing. As a result, only 20 per cent of the quota restrictions had been lifted so far, leaving the remaining quotas to be eliminated by the time the agreement itself would be terminated by December 31, 2004, thus denying New Delhi the benefit of any effective market access, he had argued.
Explaining further, he had stated that as on January 1, 1995, the Union had as many as 219 quotas. During the first stage of integration of quotas under the agreement, no quotas were removed. During the second stage from January 1, 1998, only 14 quotas were integrated and during the third stage from January 1, 2002, 38 quotas were integrated.
Officials explain that New Delhi has been paying a most-favoured-nation duty at 12.5 per cent on its garment exports to the EU even before the Union’s concession was granted to Pakistan. Once the duty-free access to Pakistan is withdrawn, garment exports from the country will receive a competitive edge, officials add. They, however, were quick to point out that Islamabad continues to enjoy some concessions under the bilateral agreement with Brussels which New Delhi does not have.
The Textiles and clothing sector is a major segment of the economy of the Third World countries, including India.
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