The Indian “independent news daily” The Citizen published, April 27, a long article by S.P. Shukla, “Peasants Can Unite the Global South To Beat Back Food Shortages,” in which he clearly supports the Indian farmers’ movement as well as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s statement that India will “feed the world,” and attacks the restrictions of the WTO. Advising against legal tangles with the WTO over India’s demand to be allowed to export from its food reserve, the paper calls on India’s farmers’ movement to take up the strategy of direct political action, which had gotten the government of India to repeal the “three black laws” over 2020-21.
Shukla, a former Commerce Minister and former Ambassador to GATT writes: “What is needed is a bold initiative in WTO to mobilize support, especially of the countries of the South, for a fresh look at the whole problem of global agrarian economy at the present critical juncture” – i.e., essentially for a new WTO agreement on agriculture. “The guiding principles should be:
“(a) Ensuring food sovereignty of all countries;
“(b) Ensuring a large degree of policy autonomy to developing countries in the matter of agricultural production, pricing, incomes and trade; in particular, to ensure food security to all, and remunerative pricing and decent income to the peasantry and to facilitate orderly transfer of surplus agricultural labor force to non-agricultural activities;
“(c) Promoting equitable and fair opportunities for international trade in agricultural products;
“(d) Promoting direct trade measures such as long term contracts to facilitate viable trade in foodstuffs, particularly among developing countries to mutual advantage of surplus and deficit countries.
