After days of hard bargaining in Geneva, trade ministers of key members of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) hammered out a deal to scrap subsidies for illegal fishing and agreed to grant a patent waiver for manufacturing Covid-19 vaccines for a period of five years to better fight the pandemic. The fishery subsidy, the continuation of which India has been keen on, has been retained.
The WTO also decided to continue the 24-year-old moratorium on slapping customs duties on electronic transmission (e-commerce trade) by the next ministerial conference of the WTO but not later than March 2024. Some of the world’s big technology firms were apprehending that if the 1998 accord lapsed this week, it could result in cross-border tariffs on purchases from Amazon.com, Netflix movies, Apple music and Sony PlayStation games, etc.
Commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal asserted: “All in all, it is a good package…There is a good outcome on the issues which are long pending.” India managed to protect the interest of its small and marginal fishermen, as the agreement on curbing harmful fishery subsidies for illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing is unlikely to dent New Delhi’s interests.
The minister is learnt to have frequently taken directions from Prime Minister Narendra Modi during the course of negotiations, as India, which was frequently seen as a deal breaker by the West, emerged as a deal maker.
Read More at https://www.financialexpress.com/economy/indias-fishery-rights-protected-in-wto-deal-patent-waiver-only-for-covid-19-vaccines/2564816/
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