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India stresses on addressing commitments delivery at WTO ministerial meet
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Saturday, 04 April, 2026, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Ashwani Maindola, New Delhi
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At the recently-concluded 14th Ministerial Conference of the WTO held in Cameroon, India emphasised that the current impasse in agricultural negotiations in the WTO stems from a trust deficit, which can only be addressed by delivering on commitments agreed in past Ministerial Conferences.
India called on constructive engagement from members on India’s submission on ‘Possible New Approaches’ for taking the agriculture negotiation forward.
As per the Ministry of Commerce, a cautious approach is necessary to prevent the diversion of negotiations and ensure consistency with past ministerial mandates regarding Public Stockholding (PSH) and the Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM).
India also urged members to adopt a development-oriented approach towards delivering a permanent solution on PSH while demonstrating the WTO’s commitment to the needs of developing countries.
Leading Indian team, Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal presented India’s 'balanced and people-centric approach' to fisheries governance. Emphasising on India’s proactive and historical conservation efforts, including the 61-day annual fishing ban, Goyal underlined India’s long-standing commitment to sustainability well before it became a global priority.
India also underscored that the challenge of overcapacity and overfishing arises from heavily subsidised industrial fleets, and not from small-scale fishermen in India and other developing countries.
On the WTO Reform agenda, Goyal emphasised that consensus-based decision-making is the bedrock of the WTO’s legitimacy, and it is important for the WTO not to ignore the sovereign right of each member to not bind itself to rules which they do not agree to.
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