-The Hindu They seek waiver on some provisions of world agreements that regulate intellectual property rights to expedite steps to contain pandemic India and South Africa, in a formal submission to the World Trade Organization (WTO) on October 2, sought a waiver on certain provisions of the international agreements that regulate intellectual property rights to speed up efforts to prevent, treat and contain the COVID-19 pandemic. In the communication, the countries said there...

Quite often it is argued by mainstream economists that a sizeable chunk of the Union Budget every year is wasted because the Government spends that on food and fertiliser subsidies. The burgeoning size of these two subsidies relative to the entire budget as well as the gross domestic product (GDP) is often used to build the argument that economic as well as environmental sustainability of the country is at stake...

-The Hindu Business Line Developed nations need to look at their own subsidies to farmers, policies on GM crop and pesticide exports The ongoing farmers’ protest has attracted a lot of global attention. So much so that the External Affairs Ministry even put out a rejoinder after some global celebrities tweeted in support of the protest. Some sections of the Indian diaspora, too, expressed their support which has attracted criticism back home. Agriculture...

-Livemint.com * Frequent policy changes create uncertainty, says report * India’s agri tariff rose from 36.4% in FY15 to 36.5% in FY21, while non-agricultural tariff rose from 9.5% to 11.1% India’s average tariff increased to 14.3% in FY21 from 13% in FY15 with the country’s policymakers frequently using trade policy measures to encourage domestic production and curb inflation, the World Trade Organization (WTO) said in its latest Trade Policy Review for Asia’s third-largest...

-PTI/ The Hindu The points were part of the report of India’s seventh Trade Policy Review (TPR), which began on January 6 at the World Trade Organization India has implemented several measures to facilitate trade, such as simplification of procedures and customs clearances for imports and exports, according to WTO. Geneva-based World Trade Organisation (WTO) said that the other trade-facilitation initiatives introduced by India since 2015 include introduction of Indian Customs Electronic Gateway...