Press Information Bureau

Government of India

Ministry of Commerce & Industry

06-July-2011 17:11 IST

Rahul Khullar addresses Seminar on Prospects of India’s Agriculture Exports: 2025 Pressure on Agri Commodity Prices Likely to Stay

Shri Rahul Khullar Secretary Commerce, delievered the inaugural address at a seminar on the prospects of India’s agriculture export in 2025: opportunities, challenges and roadmap, here today. The seminar is organised by Centre for WTO studies which is being held at Indian Institue of Foreign Trade for three days. Shri Khullar during his address said, “Traditional agriculture has suffered because of the production constraints, which in turn is holding our agri exports. Agriculture has to be competitive and it’s important that what you are producing”. Lack of research and development, inadequate infrastructure, lack of commercial agriculture, small land holdings, etc serve as a constraint and there is a strong case for agriculture reforms, he further added. During his address she stated that, global trade in agriculture is most distressed and pressure is likely to stay on agri commodity prices. Shri Khullar while commenting on the rising price of agricultural commodities said, “My own sense is that the pressure on agri prices is going to continue. I also think that domestically the (pressure on) prices are going to continue even more. However, the Government policies should not reflect a "knee-jerk reaction". The inaugural function was also attended by Shri Rajeev Kher Additional Secretary and Shri J.S Deepak Joint Secretary from the Department of Commerce. The main purpose of this seminar is to discuss various issues related to agriculture sector (especially constraints to agriculture exports) and draw a roadmap in order to make India not only self-sufficient in agriculture production but also generate export surplus in agriculture.

Speakers of the seminar noted that, in recent past, various issues related to Indian agriculture have been debated, especially, the impact of economic reforms, trade liberalization and commitments under World Trade Organisation (WTO) on Indian agriculture. Trade liberalisation under WTO has created both challenges and opportunities for the Indian agriculture sector. The liberalisation of the Indian economy during the early nineties gave hope to the agricultural sector that the opening up of the economy would facilitate in removing discrimination against agriculture. It was expected that India would benefit by signing the Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) due to the comparative advantage in the production of agriculture commodities in early nineties.

However, the outcome of Agreement on Agriculture (AoA) has not been as beneficial to India as was expected due to external and internal factors. Numerous distortions and market access barriers in the developed countries have adversely affected Indian agriculture exports. On the domestic front, vast opportunities to harness agricultural potenial still remain to be tapped for achieving higher agriucltural growth.

MA/GK

Trade liberalisation under WTO affecting agricultural exports as pressures on commodity prices persist, urging measured policy responses. Pressure on agricultural commodity prices is likely to persist, requiring measured policy responses rather than knee-jerk reactions. Domestic constraints-limited R&D, poor infrastructure, small land holdings and low commercialisation-undermine export competitiveness. Trade liberalisation under WTO brought both opportunities and challenges, and the Agreement on Agriculture has not yielded expected benefits because of external market access barriers and internal structural shortcomings. The seminar sought to identify constraints and craft a roadmap of domestic reforms and trade-policy measures to boost agricultural export capacity.