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Greater awareness of sanitary and phyto-sanitary (SPS) standards is crucial in developing countries like India are to avail of opportunities for agricultural exports in the WTO regime. SPS issues are, in fact, being increasingly seen as more important than issues relating to tariffs, as controls in the form of regulations and standards under SPS are increasing in overseas markets with growing trade liberalisation. Shri Kamal Nath, Minister of Commerce & Industry, while addressing the Forum of Financial Writers recently, had also emphasised how issues relating to health, safety standards, environment etc., could play a more important role in international trade than tariffs and quotas in the coming decade.
Admittedly, there is an information gap about quarantine systems. There is a need to strengthen Indian inspection systems and build capacities for pest risk analysis. There is a need for sanctioning of new laboratories, strengthening of labs in both the government and private sectors and for networking between them. Specific labs could specialise in testing for particular products. Laboratory equipments and lab protocols also need to be upgraded keeping in view the practices in the importing countries. Further, monitoring of residue levels is important, as also the capacity to maintain pest free areas and regions. These were amongst points brought out at a Meeting with Stakeholders in the agricultural sector organised by Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) in collaboration with UNCTAD under the aegis of the project on “Strategies and Preparedness for Trade & Globalisation in India” some time ago.
There is a need for continuously upgrading India’s food safety standards (standards for grapes were last revised in 1937!). An important issue centres around the standard to accept, given that individual countries do keep changing their standards which actually acts as a trade barrier. The national standards should be acceptable on technical grounds and would help in developing quality consciousness even among the domestic consumers.
Market surveys to see where India stands vis-à-vis international and standards of major trading countries would be useful, as also developing a system of forecasts pertaining to change in standards. This would mean closely monitoring the transparency in notification requirements as laid down in the SPS Agreement of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) as well as scanning the changes in major importing countries of India’s interest.
Awareness of the need for developing suitable domestic standards and technical assistance for standards could be provided under the Project, it was mentioned.
Equally important is to sensitise Customs officials about SPS issues and to build capacity for the development of equivalence. Other countries are interested in Mutual Recognition Agreements (MRAs) with India and hence, technical assistance in this field could be helpful.
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