WTO Chief to meet Manmohan Singh today

WTO Director General Pascal Lamy will meet Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh here today to find ways for picking up the threads from last months failed trade talks in Geneva.

New Delhi, Aug 12 : WTO Director General Pascal Lamy will meet Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh here today to find ways for picking up the threads from last month's failed trade talks in Geneva.

During his two-day visit, Lamy will also hold talks with Union Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath, and also with representatives of the Indian industry.

Besides, Lamy will attend a two-day international conference on 'Global Partnership for Development'.

The WTO Chief's visit is likely to be followed by one to the US where he will meet trade officials and try to bring them on board for maintaining the momentum to conclude the Doha trade talks that was launched in 2001.

The Doha round of talks to reduce trade barriers collapsed over the issue of farm subsidies and industrial tariffs after the US failed to agree on a proposal by India and other developing countries to help poor farmers deal with large-scale food imports.

The Geneva trade talks failed because of the differences over the special safeguard mechanism - a provision that would give developing countries like India a tool to guard against sudden surges in imports.

During the Geneva talks, it had been suggested that the safeguard mechanism in developing countries come into effect if imports in country surged by 40 per cent. However, India and the other developing countries wanted this trigger to become active in case of a 10 per cent volume surge.

ANI