The ASEAN-India Free Trade Agreement (FTA) has brought opportunities as well as challenges to the Indian industry since it came into force on 1 January 2010. There is no clear-cut estimates about the gains which will come to India especially in the sectors of agriculture, plantation and fisheries. However, some of the sectors which are labour intensive or unorganized will be facing bigger challenges.This article attempts to examine the impact of FTA where the tariff is either reduced or eliminated on some of the agricultural products like fisheries, tea and coffee, which have been projected as sensitive for India. The commitment of India and ASEAN under the FTA is analyzed along with the trade and tariff data. While doing so the article looks at some of the empirical evidence to examine the impact of India's unilateral tariff liberalization in the Post-Uruguay Round by taking into consideration India's imports, domestic production, etc. These results are then extrapolated to examine the impact of tariff liberalization on the domestic economy in view of India's commitment in the ASEAN-India FTA.The study is divided into three parts. The first part deals with the history of India-ASEAN relationship and highlights the features of India-ASEAN FTA. The second part does a case study of fisheries, tea and coffee with regard to FTA and likely impact on India. The final part gives a broad conclusion of the study.The study first looks at the bilateral trade data and then highlights the salient features of India-ASEAN FTA. It then reviews some of the literary works that CommentaryForeign Trade Review 48(4) 481-497

Developed countries are major importers of agricultural and food products from developing countries. While international trade in agricultural commodities has expanded, there has been growing consciousness by consumers about the quality of imported food products. The WTO members are legally authorized to impose sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS)-based maximum residual level (MRL) standards on imported food products to ensure that the imports are free from contaminants. Compliance with SPS-based standards and regulations is challenging for firms belonging to developing countries, for reasons including information asymmetry and lack of technological capabilities. This article uses data on Indian firms, and the SPS measures imposed by the USA on Indian products to analyse how SPS measures impact on the performance of firms, especially on the probability of the firms to participate in the export market and their export earnings. We find that the presence of standards discourages firms to participate in the export market. However, bigger firms are more productive and able to absorb the impact of SPS measures and continue to participate in export markets, even in the presence of these regulations.

No abstract

This article examines one of the major systemic issues in the process of negotiation under the Doha Round of the World Trade Organization (WTO): the tariff lines with non-ad-valorem (NAV) duties in agricultural and allied products (A&AP) and further the process of ad-valorem equivalent (AVEs) calculations. By analyzing the trade policy instruments of the QUAD countries (the United States, the EU, Canada and Japan), plus Switzerland, and comparing them with those of eight developing countries, it clearly reveals how the QUAD Plus countries have added to the overall imbalances in both tariff and non-tariff measures, thereby further constraining market access for developing countries' exports in agriculture and allied sectors.

No abstract