Key Points
New Delhi: Several member countries of the World Trade Organization (WTO), including Canada, Brazil, Australia, Japan, the UK, and the US, have questioned India over the 50 percent increase in the support it provided its farmers in 2022-23...
Other decisions, too, by the Indian government have come under question, such as the 21 percent increase in the amount it has allocated for public stockholding for food security, whether it includes actions by states when it calculates the quantum of its food subsidy, and when it will release updated data on its farmers...
According to a submission to the WTOs Committee on Agriculture in March 2024, India said its input subsidies for low-income or resource-poor farmers stood at $48.1 billion in 2022-23..
Taking into account the fact that this sum exceeds the total agriculture support from most [of] the Membership, could India justify this sudden escalation in expenditures in terms of marketing prices of fertilisers, agrochemicals, electricity and eligible number of resource-poor or low-income farmers in the country, Brazil asked...
Canada would like to reiterate concerns previously expressed regarding the lack of transparency regarding Indias state-level bonuses, which are providedover the announced minimum support prices (MSP), Canada said.. Canada understands that despite the MSP being mandated at the federal level, each of Indias 28 states and 8 union territories is responsible for adopting the MSP guidelines through its own Agriculture Produce and Marketing Committee (APMC), it added...
